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SHOWING 



THE PROBABLE CONNECTION BETWEEN HUMAN 
PROBATION AND THE ENDLESS UNI- 
VERSE THAT IS TO BE. ' 



1/ 



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* 5 






'AN 15 1886"' X ' 



iC 



nashville, tenn.i 
Southern Methodist Publishing House. 

1885 



Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1885, 

By the Book Agents of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, 

in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 



The Library 
of Congress 



WASHINGTON 



PREFACE. 



The author prefers to publish this book anonymously. 
Truth, not notoriety, is his aim and inspiration. 

The argument herein presented in support of the dogma 
of the endlessness of future punishment is the most sat- 
isfactory I have anywhere seen. The thought is equally 
elevated and original, and the style pure and pleasing. It 
is a book for thinking men and women — a book not for 
Christian thinkers only, but a book that ought to be read 
by all with an interest proportioned to the importance of 
the solemn and momentous issues it treats with such tran- 
scendent ability. 

It has given me pleasure to pass this work through the 
press, as requested by the author. My hope and prayer is 
that it may go forth with the blessing of God. 

O. P. Fitzgerald. 

Nashville, Tenn., 1885. 



INTRODUCTION. 



We are facing an endless universe to be forever protect- 
ed by moral government. We have but just entered on 
existence — infants of a day; and what the future of that 
universe will be— what shall be the outcome of its endless 
progress, what difficulties may environ it, what exigencies 
it may encounter, and especially what may be, or what 
may not be, necessary to lay the foundations of that gov- 
ernment with eternal stability, we know not, except as they 
have been revealed to us in the word of God. He who. re- 
ceives the Bible as a revelation from God, should receive 
it heartily. He should say with the reverent psalmist, "I 
will hear what God the Lord will speak," and when its 
declarations are understood, accept them without question. 
On the other hand, he who rejects the Bible declares, in so 
doing, that he knows nothing of the future; and therefore 
that, for aught he can say to the contrary, its professed rev- 
elations may, every one of them, be true. And further- 
more, that if he presumes to treat them with levity or neg- 
lect, he may be trifling with stupendous realities. Mani- 
festly, no posture is at all becoming the one who in re- 
jecting the Bible is confessedly facing an unknown future 
but that of awaiting with seriousness and reverence the up- 
lifting of the curtain; and that any thing like levity, or 
flippancy, or carelessness, in respect to the possibilities of 
that future, argues not only an uncandid and unphilosoph- 
ical mind, but a hard heart and a seared conscience, and an 

(5) 



6 Introduction. 



utter recklessness of final destiny. One thing is certain : A 
vast future is moving on to meet us with its untried scenes, 
and there is no escaping it; and what these endless ages 
shall contain for us, and what scenes we shall encounter 
when we have left the world, should be with us a matter of 
intense and solemn interest. 

The following argument is commended to the religious 
and irreligious alike, aiming as it does to show : 

1. That God is just now laying the foundations of an end- 
less moral universe, expanding and enlarging throughout 
the coming ages. 

2. That his dealings with the sinners of this world, both 
in the way of judgment and mercy, are developing those 
peculiar motives and influences which are to steady, con- 
trol, and save it in its endless career. Therefore, 

3. That human probation is a matter of serious and tre- 
mendous moment; seeing that we each one of us are sus- 
taining vital and fundamental relations to the whole vast 
universe of God, and to the progressive welfare of the end- 
less future which is before us. 



CONTKNTS. 



Chapter PART FIRST. Page 
I. Infancy of the Moral System 11 

1. No evidence from the Bible that other worlds are peo- 

pled 12 

2. No evidence from reason 15 

3. Serious objections to the assumption of a peopled 

universe 16 

4. No valid objections to the infancy of the system 17 

II. Infancy of the Moral System (continued) 21 

All the facts and intimations of the Bible favor this as- 
sumption 21 

III. The Future Universe 32 

1. Boundless in extent 33 

2. Endless in duration 34 

3. Forever expanding 34 

4. Can be protected hereafter only by moral government, 35 

IV. Liability to Rebellion Eternal 45 

The inclination to disobedience common to all moral 

beings 45 

V. Liability to Rebellion Eternal (continued). Objections... 56 

1. Then its indulgence is a matter of course, and not to 

be blamed — Remorse 56 

2. Adam for a time obeyed God 61 

x 3. The unfallen angels have not sinned 63 

4. Christ must have had an inclination to sin 66 

5. As moral beings are made in God's image, the posi- 

tion will necessitate self-denial on the part of the 

Almighty 67 

VI. Liability to Rebellion Eternal (continued) 70 

Self-will dominates the moral nature of men 70 

VII. Rebellion Must be Arrested 73 

VIII. The Appeal to Fear 77 

IX. The Appeal to Fear (continued) 81 

God's revealed dealings with sin— past, present, and 

future 81 

X. The Appeal to Fear (continued) 89 

Object of punishment 89 

XI. The Atpealto Fear Eternal 94 

(7) 



8 Contents. 



Ckapter PART SECOND. Page 
I. Four Distinct Lines of Argument 107 

1. Endless suffering not unreasonable 107 

2. No punishment less than endless would correspond 

with the magnitude and enormity of sin 108 

3. The proper education of the moral universe demands 

endless penalty for sin 109 

4. The harmony of the Divine administration necessi- 

tates endless penalty 112 

II. Argument with the Restorationists 115 

The restoration of the wicked in a future state impossi- 
ble 117 

1. Sinful character not changed by the event of death. ...117 

2. Nor by suffering 119 

3. Nor by the exertion of Divine power 125 

4. Nor by some new application of the atonement 126 

III. Argument with the Restorationists (continued) 129 

Sinful character not changed by a more favorable pro- 
bation 129 

1. Temptation by malignant beings 131 

2. Connection of the soul with a physical body 137 

3. Conditions of infancy 139 

4. Death in infancy 142 

IV. Argument with the Restorationists (continued) 144 

1. The parental relation 144 

2. Other conditions of humanity generally 146 

V. Argument with the Restorationists (continued) 151 

Sinful character not changed by the use of stronger mo- 
tives 151 

VI. Objections 165 

Condition of the heathen 165 

VII. Annihilation Impossible— Endless Freedom in Sinning Im- 
possible — The Endless Confinement of the Sinner Inev- 
itable 172 

VIII. Moral Theory of the Atonement 176 

IX. A Progressive System 184 

X. Benevolence of the Moral System 186 

XI. Conclusion 190 

XII. Quotation from Richard Baxter 192 



PART FIRST 



The Endless Future. 



Chapter I, 



INFANCY OF THE MOBAL SYSTEM. 

IT is not by any- means an unimportant 
question what position we, as a race, occu- 
py in the universe. We are a distinct part of 
"one stupendous whole," and cannot but sus- 
tain certain definite relations to its past, pres- 
ent, and future progress and development. 
What are those relations? 

Our views upon this matter will be seriously 
modified by what we conceive to be our stand- 
point of observation. We are looking out 
upon surrounding worlds. Are we surveying 
a peopled universe, or are we among the first 
of created beings? Has the peopling of tho 
worlds been going on for countless ages, so 
that our world is only an atom among the in- 
finitude of peopled worlds, and capable of ex- 
erting but the smallest influence upon the 

(11) 



12 The Endless Future. 

great whole? or are we the pioneers of a great, 
unbounded moral universe that is yet to be, 
and upon whose future unfoldings we are to 
exert a direct, powerful, and eternal influence? 
Evidently, it is of vital consequence which of 
these two views we are to entertain respecting 
our world, seeing there is just an infinite dif- 
ference between them; even a difference for it 
and ourselves between insignificance and prom- 
inence, between littleness and greatness, be- 
tween the smallest degree of influence and 
the mightiest measure of responsibility. The 
position now taken is that God is at present 
laying the foundations of his moral universe, 
and that the moral system is in its infancy. 
The proof of it is as follows: 

1. There is no evidence from the Bible that 
other worlds are peopled. 

The Bible mentions no other moral beings 
than the angels — fallen and unfallen — and the 
human race; so that to assume the existence 
of others is to go just so far beyond the di- 
vine record. Two passages only may seem to 
require consideration: 



Infancy of the Moral System. 13 

Job xxxviii. 4, 7: "Where wast thou when I 
laid the foundations of the earth, . . . when the 
morning stars sang together, and all the sons 
of God shouted for joy?" Who were these 
"sons of God?" We may suppose them to 
have been the fallen angels in the days of their 
innocence, when they may have been the only 
created beings, and, like Adam in the garden 
previous to his fall, were studying the charac- 
ter of God through his works, and coming, in 
this way, to a knowledge of God and duty, and 
reaching the point of intelligent responsibility. 
As the first of created beings, they would need 
the evidence that God was their great Creator; 
and very likely God permitted them to witness 
the creation of our earth, rising from chaos at 
his will, its foundations laid, its pillars set up, 
and its hills and vales robed in verdure, and 
fitted up, perchance, for their own residence; for 
there are a few expressions in the Bible which 
seem to indicate that this world has been their 
only habitation, and that they had their proba- 
tion on this planet; as, for example, where 
Satan is called " the god of this world," and in 



14 The Endless Future. 

the temptation of our Saviour, claimed it as his 
(Luke iv. 6), and that it was "delivered to 
him," and was not disputed. Suppose this 
passage to allude to them, how appropriate the 
appellation to them of " the morning stars " — 
the first of created beings, rejoicing in the 
spring-time of their conscious being, admiring 
the works of God, and pouring forth to him 
their songs of praise ! 

Another passage is Genesis iii. 24: "He. 
placed at the east of the garden of Eden 
cherubims" 

An elaborate article on the cherubim of the 
sacred Scriptures, by Rev. Albert Barnes, will 
be found in Yol. VIII. of the Quarterly Christian 
Spectator, in which the writer comes to the fol- 
lowing conclusion: 

"They were not angels. They are never 
spoken of as such. Nor are they represented 
either as angels, or as designed to indicate 
real forms of life. The idea of an angel, there- 
fore, at the entrance of the garden of Eden, is 
the idea of a philosophy, or the notion of the 
nursery, and without any foundation in the 



Infancy of the Moral System. 15 

Scriptures." {Christian Spectator, Vol. VIII. 
p. 386.) 

2. There is no evidence from reason that 
other worlds are peopled. 

As to the fixed stars, as Chalmers says, 
" these orbs have sent us scarce another mes- 
sage than told by their feeble glimmering upon 
the eye — the simple fact of their existence." 
And since his day the solar spectrum has re- 
vealed to us physical elements in their consti- 
tution identical with those of our planet. But 
this is all. ^ 

As to the planets, the fact of their annual and 
diurnal revolution, like our earth, their retinue 
of revolving satellites, their envelopment in an 
atmosphere, and any other facts which liken 
them to our earth, and which might, therefore, 
be supposed to indicate abodes of intelligence, 
are all equally well accounted for on the as- 
sumption that they are yet to be peopled. 

The author of the " Plurality of Worlds" 
has also shown conclusively that not a single 
fact of astronomical science looks at all in the 
direction of a peopled universe; and even be- 



16 The Endless Future. 

yond this, that all the facts of astronomy point 
to this as the only peopled world. 

3. There are serious objections to the assump- 
tion of a peopled universe. 

If peopled, then these races of moral beings 
are either in obedience to God or in rebellion 
against him. If in rebellion, then where is 
the benevolence of creating a moral system 
whose universal rebellion must have been dis- 
tinctly foreseen? 

If in allegiance, then why is our world in 
rebellion? Could a vast universe be kept in 
subjection, and yet must a single insignificant 
world like ours defy the Almighty? The re- 
sources of the Creator have availed for secur- 
ing the obedience of innumerable worlds of 
beings; why should they fail here? Or, re- 
versing the argument, if rebellion has broken 
out here, why not there? And human reason 
furnishes no answer. 

Also, if the universe of worlds be peopled, 
then have we apparently drifted in upon the 
great current of being at some indefinite pe- 
riod, and should occupy, in the universe, no 



Infancy of the Moral System. 17 

position of peculiar significance. And how 
then can the mighty plan of redemption in this 
world be accounted for, and the incontroverti- 
ble evidence from this fact that we occupy one 
of the most prominent and important positions 
in the. whole universe of God? 

Furthermore, if our position in the universe 
be one of intrinsic insignificance, as to all ap- 
pearance it must be if we are but a single 
world among the infinitude of peopled worlds, 
how comes there such a mighty contest for it 
among invisible powers? Why, for example, 
does the interest and sympathy of all heaven 
center on it, so that the conversion of a single 
sinner is welcomed with acclamations of joy? 
And why are malignant beings —the devil and 
his angels — all leagued together for its de- 
struction? And to these objections there is no 
conceivable answer. 

4. There are no valid objections to the as- 
sumption that the present is the dawning-time 
of the moral creation. 

For there must have been a beginning; and 
whatever point in duration be assumed for it, 
2 



18 The Endless Future. 

it will still have an eternity preceding; so that 
nothing is gained by assuming for it an earlier 
period than the present. 

Also, no other supposition can be less objec- 
tionable. For whatever point in past ages be 
assumed for the commencement of the moral 
universe, it will still have all the objections ly- 
ing against it which may appear to lie against 
the supposition of its present infancy. 

Neither is the existence of a vast number of 
uninhabited worlds , which the assumption in- 
volves, any objection to it; because in a pro- 
gressive system like ours we should naturally 
expect the prior creation of the material uni- 
verse, at least in part — matter before mind. 

Neither can it be objected that this hypothe- 
sis gives our insignificant world too great im- 
portance and prominence as compared with the 
universe of worlds; for no greater prominence 
is thus given to it physically than God has 
given it morally by making it the theater of 
redemption. 

Is it objected that such an assumption in- 
volves an eternity of inaction on the part of 



Infancy of the Moral System. 19 

the Almighty? So does any other that as- 
sumes a beginning for the material universe. 
For wherever that beginning is located there 
must be an eternity preceding it, and the diffi- 
culty still remains. 

Shall the attempt be made to escape this by 
assuming the eternity of the material system? 
Undoubtedly our finite minds can as readily 
comprehend the eternity of matter as of mind; 
but to assume the eternity of matter is both 
unscriptural and unphilosophical. 

First. It is unscriptural. 

The Scriptures plainly teach the creation of 
material things by the power of God. It is 
the first truth declared in the Bible (Gen. i. 1) : 
"In the beginning God created the heaven and 
the earth." The same truth is taught in He- 
brews i. 10 : "And thou, Lord, in the begin- 
ning hast laid the foundation of the earth; and 
the heavens are the works of thine hands." 
Says John in his Gospel (i. 3): "All things 
were made by him." And Paul (in Col. i. 16, 
17) is still more explicit: "By him were all 
things created that are in heaven and that are 



20 The Endless Future. 

in earth ; all things were created by him, and 
for him. And he is before all things, and by 
him all things consist." 

Secondly. The assumption is unphilosoph- 
ical. 

Reason teaches at this point the same as the 
Bible. For if matter be eternal it must be 
self-existent, and therefore independent. If 
independent, it would admit of no change, 
either in kind or degree. But the visible and 
material universe is ever changing ; proving 
thus its dependence upon higher forces, and 
is therefore not eternal. 

There is no possible view of the universe 
that does not involve a past eternity ; and this, 
to our finite apprehensions, must ever remain 
an unfathomable mystery. 

The direct testimony from the Bible is re- 
served for the next chapter. 



Infancy of the Moral System. 21 



Chapter II. 

INFANCY OF THE MORAL SYSTEM (CONTINUED). 

ALL the facts and intimations of the Bi- 
ble point decidedly to the present as the 
commencement of the moral system. 

First. The Bible gives no intimation that 
other worlds are peopled. It mentions the 
creation of the "worlds" by Jesus Christ, but 
makes no mention of their inhabitants. 

Secondly. We find the attention of all the 
angels of heaven centered on this world. Says 
the apostle : "Are they not all ministering 
spirits, sent forth to minister for them who 
shall be heirs of salvation?" (Heb. i. 14.) 
All the angels of heaven, then, are employed in 
earthly ministrations. They may be employed 
thus in other worlds, but there is not the 
slightest intimation of it ; while here we know 
they are all interested — so much so that " there 
is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth." 



22 The Endless Future. 



Thirdly. The energies of hell are also ex- 
pended upon this world. Satan is here, the 
"prince of the aerial host," tempting men, 
"working in the children of disobedience," 
and driving with fiendish hate his schemes of 
mischief. Here also are a great multitude, if 
not all, who lost with him " their first estate." 
Even the number possessing one man was 
called legion, " because they were many." 
They may be prosecuting a similar work of 
temptation elsewhere, but we have no intima- 
tion of it ; and for aught that appears to the 
contrary, they are all here in this world. This 
record of the angels, therefore, so far as it goes, 
looks strongly in the direction of this as the 
only peopled world. 

Fourthly. The atonement by Jesus Christ, 
made for mankind, is the only sacrifice for sin 
— the first and final illustration to the universe 
of God's mercy to the sinful; and all its rela- 
tions to that universe appear to be fundament- 
al. For, says the apostle, "he died unto sin 
once," and "being raised from the dead, dieth 
no more;" and "when he had by himself 



Infancy of the Moral System. 23 

purged our sins, sat down on the right-hand 
of the Majesty on high; " or, as the apostle ex- 
presses it in another place, "After he had 
offered one sacrifice for sin, forever sat down 
on the right-hand of God," as if the great 
work of eternity were then finished. And 
there John heard the whole universe of being 
chanting his praise, in his distinctive character 
still as "the Lamb slain." "And every creat- 
ure which is in heaven and on the earth, and 
under the earth, and such as are in the seas, 
and all that are in them, heard I saying, 
Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power be 
unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and 
unto the Lamb forever and ever." (Rev. v. 
13.) Is not this the laying of foundations — 
and, too, of eternal foundations? 

The fundamental relations of the atonement 
to the universe come out again in this: that 
God is now using this scheme of mercy, this 
plan of salvation, to illustrate his character 
and perfections to the angels of heaven. " To 
the intent that now unto the principalities and 
powers in heavenly places might be known by 



24 The Endless Future. 

the Church the manifold wisdom of God." 
(Eph. iii. 10.) 

This passage is worthy of special notice. 
The particular points are: that the atonement 
is represented as sustaining vital relations 
not only to the sinful of this world, but to the 
unsinning hosts of heaven. "The principali- 
ties and powers in heavenly places" — the an- 
gels and archangels, and all the ranks of holy 
intelligences that surround the throne of God 
— are also immediately affected by it. 

Then again that the moral splendors of the 
divine character are finding their most vivid 
illustration, even to the angels of heaven, 
through the works and wonders of redemption. 
Also that the prime agency in this work of 
manifestation is the redeemed Church. It is 
not made merely through the sufferings and 
death of Jesus Christ himself, but by means 
of the penitent and pardoned ones who have 
been rescued by him — through them it is that 
God is exhibiting his "manifold wisdom." 

Now, what God is doing he always intended 
to do; and so it comes out that not sinful be- 



Infancy of the Moral System. 25 

ings merely, but the loyal races of the universe 
were originally comprehended in this divine 
plan ; that it was made as truly for them as 
for us, and that they were destined from the be- 
ginning to share with us in its eternal benefits. 
Not, of course, in the same way that we do, 
for they have not sinned as we have, and do 
not need forgiveness; neither do they need 
sanctification as we do, for they are already 
holy. The design of the atonement in its re- 
lations to them is not revealed, and what it is 
we are left to conjecture. And the most 
natural conjecture is that by this appeal to 
affection, as one indispensable influence, they 
are kept from an apostasy like that of the fall- 
en angels. 

Enough, now, apart from all conjecture, that 
in some way, and for some specific purpose, 
the great atonement by Jesus Christ is reach- 
ing out in its workings far beyond this world, 
and laying hold on the hosts of heaven. And 
if on them, sinless as they are, then why not 
on all moral beings who may be hereafter 
created? 



26 The Endless Future. 

Happily, at this point we are not left en- 
tirely to conjecture; for the declaration in 
Ephesians ii. 7 is : " That in the ages to come 
he might show the exceeding riches of his 
grace, in his kindness toward us, through 
Christ Jesus." 

This plainly implies that this same work — 
that of manifesting the divine perfections, 
and through the same medium, the redeemed 
Church, and by means of the same great in- 
strumentality, the atonement by Jesus Christ 
— will be always in progress ; for the expression 
is general, and appears to cover all the coming 
ages. And so it appears that this atonement 
will be needed forever to show forth to the 
universe the perfections of the Most High. 

The point aimed at is that the plan of re- 
demption is fundamental; that it reaches be- 
yond this world, and comprehends, in some 
way, the welfare and happiness of other races 
of moral beings; the inferencp being that in 
the " ages to come," of which the apostle 
speaks, it may reach all the future races of 
the universe. Several expressions respecting 



Infancy of the Moral System. 27 

Christ look in this direction. For example, in 
Ephesians iii. 15, " the whole family in heaven 
and in earth" are named for Christ. Also in 
Colossians i. 20, he will " reconcile _ all things 
to himself, whether they be things in earth or 
things in heaven." Also in Ephesians i. 10, 
he will "gather together in one all things in 
Christ, both which are in heaven and which 
are on earth." Also in Philippians ii. 10, 11, 
" In the name of Jesus every knee shall bow, 
and every tongue confess." Also in Isaiah 
liii. 11, the declaration is that so stupendous 
are to be the results of the atonement as to 
"satisfy" the Redeemer for all his mighty 
sufferings. 

The expressions respecting the redeemed 
Church are also extremely wonderful. It is 
" a crown of glory in the hand of the Lord, 
and a royal diadem in the hand of God," and 
he that "toucheth it toucheth the apple of 
his eye." The apostle speaks of "the riches 
of the glory of his inheritance in the saints." 
He speaks of the Church of the Thessalonians 
as being "in God the Father." He says also 



28 The Endless Future. 

that Christians are " build ed together for a hab- 
itation of God; " "a chosen generation, a royal 
priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people;" 
and, to crown all, that the Church is " his body, 
the fullness of him that filleth all in all." 
What an expression — the Church, the fullness 
of the Infinite Jehovah ! 

Now, how these wonderful representations 
respecting Christ and his Church can harmon- 
ize with the reality, if this world be but a sin- 
gle one among the infinitude of peopled worlds, 
does not plainly appear. We can see no possi- 
ble way, unless its position in the universe be 
fundamental; nor how it can be fundamental, 
unless it be fundamental in time — unless we 
are among the first of created intelligences, so 
that the history of God's dealings with this 
world shall be handed down through the ages, 
and hold an important, and even a vital, rela- 
tion to the future and successful enlargement 
of the universe. In such a case, the relations 
to it of this redeemed world would indeed be 
fundamental, and a valid reason appear why 
it should be made the theater of an infinite 



Infancy of the Moral System. 29 

redemption. In that case, very likely all holy 
beings, in all worlds forever, will, in some 
way, be dependent for their holiness and hap- 
piness on the influence of the atonement; and 
thus the great Saviour become the "chief 
Corner-stone," the grand Foundation, not 
merely of this earthly dispensation, but of 
the entire economy of the universe. 

In view also of this stupendous scheme of 
redemption, it may be added that no results 
as yet witnessed appear at all to correspond 
with its wonderful magnitude and vastness. 
We see only a world of sin and wretchedness, 
and, according to the Saviour's own statement, 
but few treading the "narrow way" of salva- 
tion. And even the inhabitants of heaven are 
not so numerous but they can "all" be em- 
ployed in earthly ministrations. Here is a 
state of things clearly incongruous with the 
vastness of the expenditure, and no such mag- 
nificent results and triumphs as could " satisfy " 
the Redeemer. 

Now, God has a correct conception of pro- 
portions in the moral edifice that he is build- 



30 The Endless Future. 

ing; and the superstructure must perfectly 
harmonize with the foundation. And if the 
foundation be magnificent beyond conception, 
as it evidently is, so must the moral structure 
hereafter to be reared upon it correspond; and 
it will require eternity to fill out its adequate 
proportions. On this account also it becomes 
a most reasonable assumption that we are 
among the first of created beings. 

If, therefore, any belief is to be entertained 
respecting the period when the moral system 
was entered on, its present infancy is the most 
rational, and is the only view in perfect har- 
mony with the foregoing facts and intimations 
of the Bible. 

It is, therefore, undeniably true — by which 
is meant that there is much in favor of the 
position, and with no counteracting evidence — 
that this is our present stand-point of observa- 
tion ; that we are looking out upon the dawn- 
ing- time of the moral creation; that the work 
of peopling this material universe has but 
just commenced; that the Power which has 
begun to create free minds will never cease its 



Infancy of the Moral System. 31 

activity, so that the peopling of worlds on 
worlds with moral intelligences will be the 
ceaseless work of the unending future; and 
therefore that God is now laying the foun- 
dation-stones of that vast moral structure 
which, in the coming ages of eternity, will be 
magnificent beyond conception. 



32 The Endless Future. 



Chapter III, 

THE FUTUKE UNIVEKSE. 

THE object now in view is to obtain some 
correct impression of the greatness and 
grandeur of the future universe; and especial- 
ly some adequate conception of the amazing 
interests hereafter to be protected by law and 
government. 

The trouble men have with the sterner doc- 
trines of the Bible and the objections they 
make to them are, in a great measure, owing 
to the fact that all their other conceptions 
of God and his government, the interests to 
be protected by it, are so inadequate and de- 
fective. Their thought is confined almost 
solely to this world and the comparatively few 
beings who people it ; to a government having 
a limited and inferior range ; to interests of 
mere finite value; to a law of only ordinary 
sacredness; and even the conception of God 



The Future Universe. 



himself — the great Lawgiver and moral Gov- 
ernor of the universe, and the responsible 
Guardian of its welfare — is only that of a fond 
and doting parent, destitute of firmness, com- 
pounded of weakness and pusillanimity, and 
without sufficient authority, dignity, and 
self-respect to govern a single State of the 
Union. 

Evidently, therefore, in such a mind it is 
necessary, at the outset, to elevate its concep- 
tions of God, and his government, and his uni- 
verse, to something like their proper magni- 
tude and importance. What, then, will be the 
future of the universe? 

We notice respecting this universe that God 
is building the four following points : that it 
is boundless in extent, endless in duration, 
forever expanding, and can be protected for- 
ever only by a government of law and penalty. 

First. We consider its vastness. It is not 
bounded by this world. It extends beyond 
this comparatively diminutive planet to myr- 
iads of other worlds. It embraces the count- 
less systems which only the telescope reveals 
3 



34 The Endless Future. 

— even an infinitude of worlds and suns and 
systems, to which no power either of the eye 
or of the telescope has yet carried us. True, 
they may not yet be peopled, they may not 
be ready as yet for the occupancy of moral 
beings, but they are all doubtless to be peopled 
with free moral intelligences, amenable to the 
same laws with ourselves, comprehended in 
the same administration, and constituting to- 
gether one grand empire. 

Second. But this is not enough. We are to 
think of it also as an endless universe. We have 
no evidence that a particle of matter has ever 
been annihilated, or ever will be. We have no 
evidence that a single mind once created will 
ever cease to exist. We can, therefore, affix 
no limit to the duration of the universe, and it 
appears to be stretching on and on to eternal 
ages. To all appearance, God is building an 
endless universe. 

Third. And this is not enough. We see 
the mass of mind continually expanding and 
enlarging — millions of new minds coming year- 
ly into existence, and each and all immortal. 



The Future Universe. 35 

Hence' the fundamental law of the universe 
appears to be one of ceaseless and endless ex- 
pansion. Moreover, we see no reason why the 
same Power which has laid the foundations of 
so vast an empire, and proceeded thus far with 
its development, should not advance still far- 
ther, and find hereafter the same reason for 
exertion which it has thus far found ; nor why, 
indeed, its exertion should ever cease ; why 
God, who has begun to create, should ever 
cease creating. Space and duration are both 
apparently limitless, and, therefore, no reason 
appears why omnipotent energy should ever 
diminish its activity. And should it not, then 
will the time come when the mass of beings 
now in existence will be but the " small dust 
of the balance," compared with its magnitude 
in the coming ages. And so at this point we 
face not only an eternal, but an eternally ex- 
panding, universe of moral beings — endless in 
duration ; boundless in enlargement. 

Fourth. Here the vital question is: How 
shall these immeasurable interests be so 
protected that the universe will expand end- 



36 The Endless Future. 

lessly in holiness and happiness. And the 
answer is: This universe can be protected for- 
ever only by a government of law and pen- 
alty. 

The grand peril of the system is that it is a 
system of free moral agents — free to obey 
God, or to disobey him ; and that this freedom 
must not be interfered with. And so the real 
question is : How shall this universe of free 
moral beings be secured in the exercise of its 
freedom, and still be protected forever from 
the disastrous inroads of rebellion, insubordi- 
nation, and anarchy, and be held forever in 
intelligent and voluntary loyalty to God? 

And this makes the problem of its future 
development a tremendously serious one, be- 
cause there is opened before it these two end- 
lessly diverging paths, on either of which it 
is free to enter — one of endless and ever-in- 
creasing holiness and blessedness, the other 
of endless sin and wretchedness; and which of 
the two it shall take is the question, and how 
shall it be kept true to God and duty is the 
problem to be solved. 



The Future Universe. 37 

Some never think of this, and suppose God 
could make a moral system move on in har- 
mony, holiness, and happiness as easily as he 
could make the sun to rise in the heavens; 
when, as a matter of fact, physical power, even 
though it be omnipotent, cannot touch it. 
God's great moral system of the universe can 
be guided and protected forever only by moral 
government — a government of motive — a gov- 
ernment whose foundations are laid in reward 
and punishment, promises and threatenings, 
invitations and warnings, and which must be 
wielded forever through these instrumentali- 
ties alone; all of which are comprehended 
in this one statement : a government of law, 
whose sanctions are reward and penalty. This 
point needs to be further illustrated and en- 
forced. 

The position that because God is omnipotent 
he can compel a moral being, and so enforce 
obedience and prevent sin and its punishment, 
assumes that moral beings are, in some re- 
spects, like machines; that mind can be gov- 
erned somewhat, at least, like matter — that it 



38 The Endless Future. .,. 

can be compelled, as matter is, by force; and if 
that force be only omnipotent, then, of course, 
all that opposes must yield, and all effectual re- 
sistance become impossible ; and so sin be 
prevented, and obedience secured, by the mere 
exertion of power. 

But this view contradicts both the Bible 
and reason. The Bible says men do resist — 
even that they resist God, and resist him suc- 
cessfully. Said Stephen to the wicked Jews : 
"Ye do always resist the Holy Ghost; as your 
fathers did, so do ye" — asserting thus that 
the Jewish nation had resisted him for cent- 
uries. 

Said our Saviour to Jerusalem : "How often 
would I have gathered thy children together 
as a hen doth gather he'r brood under her 
wings, and ye ivould not " — where the statement 
is equally decisive, that even the Almighty 
Saviour was successfully resisted in his kind 
efforts to save. "Ye ivould not" is the grand, 
appalling difficulty that baffles even Omnipo- 
tence in its benevolent efforts for human sal- 
vation, and such our Saviour represented it. 



The Future Universe. 39 

But says some one, "How can omnipotence 
be resisted ? " Answer: By the moral powei 
of a moral being. Omnipotence is only phys- 
ical power, and has no natural relations to 
moral power, and cannot touch it. But no 
matter for the hoiv. The fact is all we are 
concerned with. It is resisted. Said Stephen: 
"Ye do always resist the Holy Ghost." Was 
it a weak instrumentality they were resisting, 
either in its nature or exertion? No. It was 
God's omnipotent Spirit, working out the in- 
finite unwillingness of God that men should 
perish which they were resisting; in its nature 
the mightiest, in its exertion the mightiest. 
Such is the Bible representation. 

Look now at the reason of the case. Evi- 
dently a moral system cannot be governed by 
material forces any more than a material and 
physical system by moral forces. It is clear 
that the solar system cannot be managed by 
persuasion, nor the engineer drive his locomo- 
tive by advice. No less absurd would it be to 
imagine a system of free moral agents as being 
governed by mere power and force. 



40 The Endless Future. 

Moral beings are not machines, and cannot 
be moved by force, though exerted to any ex- 
tent. Even Omnipotence cannot compel free- 
dom, for then it would be freedom no longer. 
Indeed, there is no more intrinsic absurdity 
in imagining an engineer to get his locomotive 
on the track, and then attempt to drive it by 
reading to it the Ten Commandments than in 
supposing God to put his moral creature on 
the track of free and responsible action, and 
then attempting to move him by power — by 
force of his omnipotence. 

The fact is, the two great empires of matter 
and mind are governed by influences utterly 
unlike — one by force and compulsion, and the 
other by motive and persuasion. And each 
must be governed by its own appropriate influ- 
ence. It will be impossible to govern either 
by the influence that belongs to the other. 
Even God cannot do this, for then he would 
act inconsistently with his own works; and 
this would involve self -inconsistency ; and 
God cannot act inconsistently with himself, 
for then he would cease to be God. So we 



The Future Universe. 41 

say that God cannot govern mind by force any 
more than he can govern matter by motive. 

Would it rob God of his omnipotence at all 
to say that he cannot govern the solar system 
by the Ten Commandments? Certainly not; 
for this is only saying that he cannot act in- 
consistently with his own works; that is, he 
cannot use with matter an influence appro- 
priate only to mind. 

On the other hand, would it rob God of his 
omnipotence at all to say that he cannot con- 
vert men with crow-bars? Certainly not; for 
this involves a similar inconsistency. It is 
only saying that he cannot use with mind an 
influence appropriate only to matter. It plain- 
ly appears, therefore, that force cannot be 
used in the government of mind, and that 
omnipotence, or infinite force, is just as pow- 
erless for this as finite. Even God himself 
can govern mind only by motive, and his 
moral universe only by law and its appropriate 
sanctions; or, as our discussion is limited to 
the consideration of the one sanction of pen- 
alty, we will speak of it only as a government 



42 The Endless future. 

of law and penalty. Here certain things re- 
specting this government are to be noticed : 

1. This law must be properly enforced. This 
government must have a firm and stable ad- 
ministration. Nothing must be left at loose 
ends. Disobedience must be promptly met by 
its appropriate punishment, and thus be made 
to appear to all the subjects of government to 
be unsafe. Otherwise there will be no effect- 
ual barrier to the inroads of rebellion. If any 
government can be safely trifled with, it will 
be. If the subjects of government see that 
they can safely take their own way, instead of 
the way the government orders, they will take 
their own way. They will push the govern- 
ment aside. They will despise the law and 
trample on the authority of the lawgiver; so 
that the welfare and happiness of any and 
every community of moral beings rest neces- 
sarily upon a firm and stable administration 
of the government over them. 

This accords with our entire observation of 
the workings of human society. The peace 
and order of the family are secured only by 



The Future Universe. 43 

parental authority enforced; and the most un- 
happy and the least prosperous of all earth's 
families are those the most poorly governed. 

The village school cannot be properly man- 
aged unless the conviction is in some way set- 
tled in the minds of the pupils that disobe- 
dience is unsafe; and nothing can win for the 
teacher their respect and affection while be- 
lieving that he is wanting in the firmness 
necessary to punish transgression. 

The State can be governed only by law and 
penalty; and every interest suffers if the ad- 
ministration be not efficient and the execution 
of penalty thorough. 

Every government, in order to be respected, 
must be administered thoroughly and effective- 
ly, and all rebellion against authority be met 
by prompt and appropriate punishment. 
. 2. This government must protect the uni- 
verse as it is. 

Every government properly administered 
must adapt itself to the peculiarities and exi- 
gencies of the community over which it is 
wielded. Otherwise its administration be- 



4A The Endless Future, 

comes unworthy of confidence. Whatever the 
peculiarities of the State or nation may be, 
the government must protect it as it is. No 
two nations on earth can be governed precise- 
ly alike. Their distinguishing peculiarities 
forbid it. And therefore if God's great uni- 
verse be one of ceaseless and endless expan- 
sion — if that be its peculiarity — then his gov- 
ernment over it must correspond, and meet all 
the necessary demands of an eternal and eter- 
nally expanding universe. 

Here we begin to see what stupendous 
foundations of government must be laid ade- 
quately to sustain such a superstructure; and 
if the foundations of law and penalty, as we 
shall hereafter consider them, should appear 
to be massive beyond expression, should ap- 
pear to be infinite foundations — if law is end- 
less and penalty endless — the solution of the 
matter may be found in this : that God is 
building so vast a universe, and laying the 
foundations of a government over it that must 
stand the strain of eternity. 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 45 



Chapter IV, 

THE LIABILITY TO REBELLION ETERNAL. 

THE inclination to disobedience is common to 
all moral beings. 

The design now is to show that the liability, 
tendency, and temptation of all moral beings 
who either have been or can be created is to 
break away from the necessary restraints of 
law and government, and to go off in rebellion 
against the authority of the Most High. 

The view is not unfrequently entertained 
that a pnre and perfect being would obey God 
as a matter of course; and that submission to 
his will on the part of such a one would re- 
quire no self-denial. Our leading theologians 
are accustomed to speak of Adam in the 
garden as one whose only inclination was to 
obedience, and to trace his subsequent sinful- 
ness solely to the temptation of the devil; and 
how, then, the benevolence of the temptation 



46 The Endless Future. 

could be defended does not appear. Dr. 
Bushnell speaks of him as "spontaneous to 
good." 

But were this true, the first sin would have 
been impossible. If submission to God were 
an entirely easy matter, then submission would 
have been always rendered; and the first sin 
becomes, if not exactly impossible — for that ex- 
pression would seem to conflict with free agen- 
cy< — yet as certain not to be committed as if it 
were. 

But there was a first sin; and it must have 
been committed under the three following con- 
ditions : 

1. Those who committed it came directly 
from the hand of God, and were therefore 
pure and perfect in their original constitution. 

2. They must have been placed in the best 
possible circumstances — the best surroundings 
for the development of a holy character. We 
argue both these points from the assumed be- 
nevolence of God. 

3. They encountered no temptation from ma- 
lignant beings; for there were no unholy be- 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 47 

ings to present it. Hence their position was 
in all respects the best calculated to result in 
holiness. 

The vital point is thus demonstrated that 
an occasion of sin must exist in a pure and 
perfect being, placed in the best possible cir- 
cumstances. What could it have been? 

This leads us to consider the occasion of sin. 

The word occasion is here used with careful- 
ness and precision, as being entirely distinct 
from the efficient cause. For example: the oc- 
casion of gluttony is the natural appetite for 
food ; but because that between this occasion 
and the gluttony there comes in the free, 
moral, and responsible being, under obligation 
to keep all his inclinations in due subordina- 
tion to the higher dictates of reason and con- 
science, therefore does he himself become the 
efficient cause of the sinful gluttony. For the 
occasion he is in no way responsible, while he 
shoulders the entire burden of responsibility 
for the sinful gluttony. So the efficient cause 
of sin in any form can only be the moral be- 
ing himself who commits it ; and the question 



48 The Endless Future. 

now to be considered is, How comes it that a 
being made in the image of God, and pure 
and perfect in his original constitution, be- 
comes the efficient cause of sin? 

1. Every being made in God's image must 
be free — truly free — or else he would not be 
made in his image. 

2. He must be conscious that he is free. He 
cannot be free without being conscious of it. 

3. He must love to exercise this freedom 
in the way of independent action, which 
means mainly that he must love to seek and 
obtain whatever pleases him — to seek his own 
personal gratification without restraint. He 
cannot have this freedom without loving to 
exercise it — in common language, without lov- 
ing to have his own way. Nothing indeed is 
plainer than that he cannot but love the ob- 
jects which minister to his gratification. He 
must delight to seek his enjoyment in every 
avenue opened — to roam the universe at will, 
taxing every object, every scene, every em- 
ployment affording satisfaction. Therefore, 

4. To give up this independence of action, 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 49 

and submit to restraint, which oftentimes in- 
volves the giving up of objects in themselves 
desirable, cannot be an easy matter. It 
must cost a struggle. It is going against in- 
clination — practicing self-denial. And this 
must be attended with reluctance, and a re- 
luctance just proportioned to the love of inde- 
pendence. By just so much as he loves his 
own way, by just that much he must make an 
effort in order to surrender it. But, 

5. It is his highest duty to surrender it, 
and consent to be guided, governed, and re- 
strained, if need be, as God may see fit, as the 
only security for the harmony and welfare 
of the universe, which requires the merging 
of all wills in the one controlling will of the 
Almighty. Without this submission to God, 
each one, acting out his natural inclinations, 
would set up for himself, and there would be 
as many independent wills as there are indi- 
viduals, each acting for himself, and with no 
paramount regard for the general good; and 
the resulting collision, strife, discord, and suf- 
fering would be uncontrollable and dreadful; 
4 



50 The Endless Future. 

so that the only security for the harmony and 
happiness of the universe is the submission 
of all individual wills to the one controlling 
will of God. Hence we see that the great de- 
mand of the Bible upon this wicked and re- 
bellious world for "submission to God," for a 
"change of heart," for "conversion," for a 
"new heart," for a "new birth" — for they all 
mean one and the same thing — is laid in the 
very foundations, the ultimate and imperious 
necessities, of the moral universe. Therefore, 

6. We see the absolute necessity that God 
assert his control over his moral creature, and 
give him his law with its two cardinal re- 
quirements — loving God with all his heart, 
and his neighbor as himself — and enforce 
obedience to it with the whole weight of his 
authority. 

7. In this view the occasion of sin be- 
comes a disinclination to the necessary restraints 
of law and government, growing out of the lore 
of conscious freedom in a free moral agent. It 
is a temptation to sin, but not itself sinful; 
and originates in the individual, just as the 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 51 

apostle says (James i. 14, 15): "Every man is 
tempted when he is drawn away of his own 
lust * and enticed. Then when Inst hath con- 
ceived, it bringeth forth sin." Notice the sev- 
eral points : 

1. It is "his own lust" — that is, it originates 
in himself; so that the external influence, 
whatever it may be — whether the devil, or 
wicked men, or circumstances — only stirs up 
a something that was all the while in him, 
his own lust. This something we have made 
out in this discussion to be a love of having his 
own way. 

2. It is a something that is innocent. It 
comes in before the sin — it bringeth forth the 
sin; so that the sin comes in after it. There- 
fore, this lust — this occasion of sin — is and 

* This word lust in this passage is not a happy translation 
of the original Greek, being almost invariably used in a 
bad sense; whereas in the original the word only means 
innocent desire, being the same word used by Paul when he 
says, " Having a desire to depart and be with Christ ; " and 
by our Saviour when he says, " With desire I have desired 
to eat this passover with you." 



52 The Endless Future. 

must be innocent, constitutional propensity. 
And this is precisely the view taken in the 
foregoing discussion. 

The occasion of sin is thus seen to be insep- 
arable from free agency under the restraint of 
law; and some particulars respecting it are 
deserving of special notice. 

1. It lies back of voluntary action, and is 
therefore destitute of moral character — a mere 
constitutional element. Therefore, 

2. It is not at all of the nature of depravity, 
nor does it imply any defect in the original 
constitution, and is consistent with perfect in- 
nocence, and even holiness. 

3. In this view every being in the uni- 
verse who sins, whether man or devil, sins 
solely because he dislikes the restraint of law, 
and shrinks from the self-denial necessary to 
obedience. This is the occasion of the sin. 
The real sin, and where all the guilt centers, is 
the disobedience itself — the act of transgres- 
sion, the determination to break the law and 
have his own way. 

The law may be a mere imperative of the 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 53 

reason and the conscience, or it may be a com- 
mand rightly imposed by another, to whose 
rightfulness, however, the reason assents; but 
in either case it is law, coming down upon a 
moral being with the demand of obedience to 
rightful authority. In the former case the in- 
dividual becomes, in the language of the apos- 
tle, "a law unto himself, his conscience also 
bearing witness." (Rom. ii. 15.) In the lat- 
ter he comes under the authority of another — ■ 
a parent, guardian, master, or ruler; and the 
sin resulting from disobedience is always dis- 
obedience to rightful authority — to law. Sin 
is ever therefore "the transgression of the 
law." "Where no law is there is no transgres- 
sion." (Bom. iv. 15.) 

4. The leading peculiarity of this view is 
that it represents the occasion of sin as insep- 
arable from a free nature under this necessary 
restraint of law, and belongs therefore to a 
moral being by virtue of his creation; and 
is as inseparable from the soul as freedom it- 
self. 

Th.3 vital point is thus demonstrated that 



54 The Endless Future. 

the occasion of sin is inseparable from a free 
nature, and belongs therefore necessarily to the 
nature of all moral beings who either have 
been or can be created; so that even a pure 
and perfect being cannot submit to the neces- 
sary restraints of God's law without a strug- 
gle; and therefore that all newly-created be- 
ings forever will have the same inclination to 
break away from the restraints of law and gov- 
ernment which has already broken out in the 
sinning angels and men. 

With the existence and operation of this 
element in human society we are all familiar. 
The inclination of the whole world is to their 
own pleasure. The very first development of 
the infant mind is in the direction of impa- 
tience of restraint — he wants his own way. 
This is the leading characteristic of childhood 
also, and is what creates the necessity for pa- 
rental authority in the family. This is the 
chief trouble in the community — that men 
want their own way, instead of seeking the 
general good. This, too, makes government 
necessary in the State; and even on the broad 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 55 

field of national experience the sole occasion of 
dif&cnlty is the preference of the individual 
over the general good. "For all seek their own ' 
is the grand trouble of the universe. 

And this element is apparently inseparable 
from free moral agency; for, as we have seen, 
a moral being is free-^knows that he is, feels 
that he is — loves necessarily the indulgence 
of his freedom; therefore dislikes restraint, 
therefore rebels against it, even though that 
restraint be the law of God himself. And as 
no moral being can be created without having 
this love of conscious freedom, and this in- 
clination to exercise it, therefore it will be 
common to all the future races of the uni- 
verse, and the liability to rebellion will be 
eternal. 



56 The Endless Future, 



Chapter V, 



THE LIABILITY TO EEBELLION ETERNAL 
(CONTINUED). OBJECTIONS. 

IT is objected: (1) That if this dislike of re- 
straint be a necessary element in the nature 
of a moral being, then its indulgence is a mat- 
ter of course, and not to be wondered at; and 
that a moral being cannot be blamed for in- 
dulging it. 

Answer: This objection overlooks the essen- 
tial elements of a free nature — namely, that 
the will, the power of choice, lies between 
the dictates of reason and the admonitions of 
conscience on the one hand, and this inclina- 
tion to indulgence on the other; and that the 
free moral agent is as free to follow the one 
as the other. Moreover, that the stronger mo- 
tive, as estimated by its nature, by its appeal 
to his own highest good, and the highest good 
of all in any way affected by his conduct, is 
always on the side of reason and conscience, 



Liability to Relellion Eternal. 57 

of God and the Holy Spirit; so that the man, 
under all possible circumstances, feels under 
obligation to follow them and do as his Maker 
commands him, cost what it may in the way 
of sacrifice and self-denial. The absence of 
this freedom of choice would reduce him to 
the level of the brute creation, who act neces- 
sarily in carrying out their desires, knowing 
no other way of acting but in the direction of 
the strongest inclination, and who are there- 
fore destitute of moral character, and are ig- 
norant of their relations to God. A moral be- 
ing is not thus constituted. He knows God 
as his Creator, Preserver, and rightful Govern- 
or, and understands the claims of duty and 
moral obligation, and knows and feels that he 
is ever bound to be governed by them. 

Although, therefore, this inclination to in- 
dependence — this being "drawn away of one's 
own lust," as the apostle terms it — this occa- 
sion of sin, belongs to the necessary nature of 
free agency, yet, as has been said, it is in it- 
self innocent. It is only the indulgence of it, 
the yielding to it improperly, that is sin. 



58 The Endless Future. 

Now, when rightful authority meets a moral 
being in any form to which he feels disin- 
clined to yield, reason and conscience press 
him at once to resist this love of independence, 
this temptation, this "drawing away of his 
own lust," and submit to the requirement. 
And if he would but resist it, as he might do, 
and ought to do, and as God commands him to 
do — as the devil might have done, and Adam 
might have done, and both should have done — 
not only would there be no sin in him, but he 
would merit the commendation, " Blessed is the 
man that endureth temptation." But if he yields 
to it, he sins, and assumes the entire respon- 
sibility of the wrong-doing. He is never any 
more excusable in yielding to this occasion 
than is the glutton in his gluttony. Who 
would excuse a man for acting like a beast? 

True, he loves to follow his inclination, and 
does follow it, and sins; but were there any 
thing in the impulse which excuses him in fol- 
lowing it, there would be no ground or expla- 
nation of that remorse which rends the guilty 
soul. 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 59 

Eemoese is the soul upraicling itself for its 
sin; and wherever felt, is its own clear testi- 
mony to three things: 

1. That the siri committed was wholly un- 
necessary. Could a convicted soul, in the ex- 
tremity of its torment from remorse, be made 
to see and feel that back of its wickedness 
there lay a necessity under which it acted, the 
remorse would cease at once. It would in- 
stantly clear itself from blame and from men- 
tal suffering by the reflection, "I could not 
help it," and be at peace. There would no 
longer be ground for remorse or the possibil- 
ity of it. There might be any amount of re- 
gret at the unpleasant consequences which 
have followed, but there could be no self-re- 
proach at being the guilty author of those con- 
sequences; and this is the essential ingredient 
in remorse. 

2. Eemorse is the soul's testimony that the 
sinful conduct was 'inexcusable. If in certain 
complicated cases of human action there are 
some things which appear inexcusable and oth- 
ers not, the remorse reaches only those which 



60 The Endless Future. 

are seen to be inexcusable, and keeps exact 
pace with the inexcusableness. Whatever is 
seen to be excusable ceases to distress. Self- 
reproach extends only to that for which the 
soul can find no good excuse. 

3. The testimony of the soul under remorse 
is, that in the precise circumstances in which 
it acted wrong it should have acted exactly the 
other way — either not to do what it did or to 
do that which it neglected to do. Observe, 
the conviction of the remorseful soul is that 
there should have been an entire change in 
the conduct, with no change in the circumstances. 
It blames itself for acting as it did, the cir- 
cumstances remaining as they were; thus giv- 
ing its own highest testimony to its own per- 
fect freedom. 

However wicked men may reason against 
their own freedom and responsibility, one 
pang of remorse within them gives the lie to 
all their assumptions against it, dissipates all 
their sophistries, and arraigns them at the bar 
of their own consciences as being guilty and 
deserving of punishment for acting just as they 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 61 

did, and with no change of circumstances. And 
this is freedom — freedom in choice, power of 
contrary choice — freedom of will, absolute 
and unqualified. 

On the whole, therefore, no good reason for 
sin can exist, for then it would not be sin, 
and poor ones are worthless; and even the oc- 
casion of sin, which has been stated as belong- 
ing to free agency, is yet one that should ever 
be kept in subordination to the higher law of 
reason and conscience — that law which de- 
mands that God be obeyed at any cost of sac- 
rifice and self-denial. 

It is objected: (2) That Adam in the gar- 
den obeyed God for some considerable time 
after his creation, and therefore could not have 
had in him, at the outset, any such occasion 
of sin as is now insisted on. 

Answer : All the character Adam had earned 
previous to his fall was earned only by obe- 
dience to commands which crossed none of 
his natural inclinations, and cost him no self- 
denial — the law of marriage and the Sabbath, 
and the command to dress and keep the gar- 



62 The Endless Future. 

den. No commands had been imposed which 
interfered at all with his pleasure — his incli- 
nations; and the commendations so often 
lavished upon him for his goodness, obedi- 
ence and holiness, are groundless. It was a 
goodness that cost nothing, and was worth as 
little. 

But to the point in question: How could 
obedience in such circumstances prove that 
he had no constitutional disinclination to sub- 
mit to the proper and necessary restraints of 
law and authority? The fact was that no 
sooner was he crossed than he refused to obey. 
No sooner did he find that the tree was "good 
for food, and a tree to be desired to make 
one wise," and thus had an inclination awak- 
ened to partake of it, than his love of having 
his own way overpowered all other considera- 
tions, and in the face of commands and warn- 
ings and threatenings, and reason and con- 
science, broke out in open rebellion against 
restraint; and that too in so insignificant a mat- 
ter as the possession of a single tree, when al- 
owed freely to partake of all the other trees 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 63 

of the garden. Certainly his recorded expe- 
rience, so far as it goes, proves only the truth 
of our position — that the occasion of sin is 
common to all moral beings. 

It is objected: (3) That the unf alien an- 
gels have not sinned; and how then can the 
occasion of sin be common to all moral be- 
ings? 

Answer: This objection is usually rendered 
especially serious from the assumption that 
they were created at the same time with the 
fallen angels, and that both existed together 
for a time in holiness and happiness. But 
this idea is purely Miltonian, and has no foun- 
dation in the Scriptures. The fallen angel 
only is mentioned in the beginning. More- 
over the assumption that both were created 
at the same time starts troublesome questions: 
If a part sinned, why not all? if God could 
keep a part from sinning, why not all ? And 
there is no satisfactory answer. 

When they were created, we know not. No 
mention is made of them till the time of 
Abraham. We may locate them, therefore, 



64 The Endless Future. 

anywhere before that time where their position 
will best harmonize with the general system. 
In the absence of all opposing evidence, and 
following the Biblical order, they are assumed 
to be the third order of created intelligences. 
Why have they not sinned like their prede- 
cessors ? Perhaps, 

1. The firmness of God in the punishment 
of the sinning angels, making thus the high- 
est possible appeal to fear, and operating most 
powerfully to deter them from transgression, 
may have had its influence. Also, 

2. They have witnessed the mercy of God 
in redemption. They have seen him stooping 
in pity to the lost, and making thus the high- 
est possible appeal to affection; and they can- 
not contemplate it without being drawn to him 
in wonder, admiration, and love. "Which 
things the angels desire to look into." Also, 

3. The Scriptures clearly indicate that the 
angelic host have in it a personal interest. No- 
tice the representation which John gives in 
Revelation v. 12 of the song sung by the an- 
gelic host, whose number was "ten thousand 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 65 

times ten thousand and thousands of thou- 
sands." It is not enough for them simply to 
praise God as being their Creator, Preserver, 
and Benefactor. It is not enough for them 
to praise Jesus Christ as being the "bright- 
ness of the Father's glory, and the express 
image of his person." But for some reason 
the kindling emotions of their souls find their 
only appropriate expression in saying with a 
loud voice, "Worthy is the Lamb that teas 
slain." The Lamb slain — Christ dying — is with 
them also, as with the "elders," the grand 
theme of their rejoicing. And who shall say 
that to this death of the Redeemer, and the 
manifestation made by it of the mercy and love 
of God, they may not be indebted, as one in- 
fluence, for their preservation from sin? The 
Scriptures certainly favor the supposition.* 

*An extract from Conybeare and Howson on the Epistle 
to the Colossians is significant in this direction: 

" It is sufficient to observe that Saint Paul is still led to 
set forth the true greatness of Christ in opposition to the 
angelolatry of the Colossian heretics, intimating that, so 
far from Christ's being one only of the angelic hierarchy, 
the heavenly hosts themselves stood in need of his atonement." 
5 



66 The Endless Future. 

4. They are also deterred from sinning by 
the punishment of the ungodly of this world. 
The declaration in Revelation xiv. 10 is that 
the sinners there spoken of should be "tor- 
mented in the presence of the holy angels." 
Why should they be compelled to witness so 
dreadful a sight if it were not necessary ? Why 
necessary but for its moral effect upon them ? 
What moral effect can be imagined as neces- 
sary but to keep them from apostasy? In 
these circumstances, the fact that they have 
not sinned is no proof of a want of inclination 
to sin; while their entire history, and espe- 
cially the fact that they are compelled to wit- 
ness the torments of the wicked, greatly favors 
the supposition of a strong inclination within 
them to independence and self-will. 

It is objected again: (4) That this position 
assumes a similar element in the human nat- 
ure of Christ. 

Answer: The Scriptures themselves teach 
this. Christ is declared to have been "made 
in all things like as we are," and to have been 
" tempted in all points like as we are." ( Heb. ii. 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 67 

17; iv. 15.) Also it says he "pleased not him- 
self" (Horn. xv. 3); consequently went against 
his pleasure — his natural inclinations; conse- 
quently denied himself, showing that he had 
inclinations which needed to be denied, just as 
we have. Had he "pleased himself," and fol- 
lowed his inclinations, as we do, he would have 
sinned; but he said rather, "Not my will, but 
thine be done." By "will " is here meant wish, 
or inclination; and his inclination he resisted. 
And this inclination was precisely the same 
inclination which leads us to sin, and would 
have led him to sin had he not resisted it. At 
this point, therefore, he was indeed tempted pre- 
cisely as we are, and therefore had in him the 
same inclination to resist the necessary re- 
straints of law and government which we and 
all other moral beings have. 

It is objected again: (5) That as moral be- 
ings are made " in God's image," the foregoing 
position will necessitate self-denial on the part 
of the Almighty. True; and obedience to the 
great law of benevolence, to which he also is sub- 
ject, does call for self-denial even on his part. 



68 The Endless Future. 

"He doth not afflict willingly" says the 
Scriptures (Lam. iii. 33) ; and therefore by just 
so much as he does not must he repress the 
immediate promptings of his pitiful nature; 
and because the highest good demands it, de- 
ny himself, and still continue the infliction. 

Again: "Not willing that any should perish" 
(2 Pet. iii. 9); and therefore by just so much 
as he is not willing must he repress the strong 
impulses of affection for the creature he has 
made; and because the general good demands 
the maintenance of his law and government 
inviolate, must he still deny himself, and pun- 
ish him as he deserves. 

But far above and beyond these, the giv- 
ing of his only Son for human salvation was 
an act of infinite self-denial on the part of the 
Almighty. 

Thus, in the mutual relations of moral be- 
ings, self-denial for the general good has be- 
come the law of the universe. " If any man will 
come after me, let him deny himself'' (Matt. xvi. 
24), is undoubtedly not merely the law of this 
world, but of all worlds. Even God does not 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 69 

exempt himself from self-denial; and lie, there- 
fore, who refuses to practice it, and so remain 
true to God and duty, assails the universal 
welfare, disobeys the Almighty, and deserves 
the very uttermost of condemnation. 

There is, therefore, no valid objection to the 
position we are considering — that the occa- 
sion of sin is common to the nature of all 
moral beings who either have been or can be 
created. 

And so we reach the appalling conclusion 
that the liability to rebellion is eternal; that 
all through the coming ages there will be in 
all moral beings — as they shall be successively 
created for peopling the universe of worlds — 
the same constitutional tendency to rebellion 
which has already broken out in the sinning 
angels and men. 

Here, then, is an endless difficulty to be end- 
lessly met and surmounted by the Almighty; 
so that whatever influences are now necessary 
to restrain it will be always necessary, and to 
manage and control it be the endless work of 
the endless ages. 



70 The Endless Future. 



Chapter VI, 

the liability to eebellion eteenal 
(continued). 

SELF-WILL dominates the moral nature of 
men. 
This inclination to independence and self- 
will works in the moral nature with fearful en- 
ergy. It not merely exists in it, but domi- 
nates it, so that a free being will do and dare 
any thing before he will give up his own will. 
Illustrations of this are abundant. The rebel 
angels dared the wrath of God rather than 
give up their own will and way. Adam in the 
garden did the same. We witness the same 
thing now in the rebellion of the child against 
parental authority. What terrible collision 
often results! What determination! what des- 
peration! — the struggle protracted for hours, 
and sometimes for days, before the point of 
yielding is reached. Also take the world over 



Liability to Rebellion Eternal. 71 

— the last thing men will give up is their own 
wills. Even persons of great constitutional 
amiability not unfrequently find a terrible 
struggle in submitting to God, while the mass 
of men will not even attempt submission, and 
dare the attitude of persistent and life-long 
rebellion against the Almighty. And this at- 
titude of hostility to God is not the result of 
ignorance. The child of pious parents, edu- 
cated to believe the Bible, and who has never 
doubted for a moment the doctrine of the end- 
less punishment of the wicked, will yet go on 
in sin day after day for years, believing that 
every moment he is daring the wrath of God, 
and risking his eternal salvation. And yet he 
will knowingly incur this infinite danger rather 
than give up his own will and submit to God. 
And so strong is this willful purpose of rebell- 
ion, long persevered in, that the Bible likens 
its surrender to matters of utter impossibility 
— like the "Ethiopian changing his skin or the 
leopard his spots." (Jer. xiii. 23.) And the 
actual surrender of it, when finally reached 
under the patient and persistent operations of 



72 The Endless Future. 

the Divine Spirit, and the workings of God's 
providence, is likened to the exertion of the 
Almighty energy in the raising of Jesus Christ 
from the dead. In Ephesians i. 19, 20, the 
apostle calls it "the exceeding greatness of 
his power toward us who believe, according to 
the working of his mighty power, which he 
wrought in Christ when he raised him from 
the dead." 

And now this same reluctance to submission 
to the restraints of law and government will 
appertain to all newly-created beings here- 
after, and work in them with the same desper- 
ate energy with which it has thus far worked 
in the sinning angels and men; so that this 
liability to rebellion is one of fearful import — 
a fearful emergency in the unfoldings of the 
future universe, and one that needs to be grap- 
pled with with the very energies of Omnipo- 
tence. 



Rebellion Must be Arrested. 73 



Chapter VII. 



REBELLION MUST BE ARRESTED. 

REBELLION has already broken out in 
the sinning angels and men, and there 
is a manifest liability and danger that it will 
break out hereafter and forever in other races 
of the expanding universe. 

Now, therefore, this tendency to insubordi- 
nation must be met. It must be kept down 
hereafter and forever in newly-created beings. 
And it must be kept down at all hazards and 
any and every conceivable sacrifice necessary. 
No matter what the cost or sacrifice may be, 
if it will but do this it is benevolent. Why ? 

It has been already said that only as all wills 
were submitted to the one controlling will of 
the Almighty was there any security for the 
welfare of the future universe. This is true, 
but is at the same time a very faint and inad- 
equate statement of the case. It is also true 



74 The Endless Future. 

that without this the whole moral universe 
would become an eternal desolation, because 
anywhere and everywhere in society lawless- 
ness is temporal perdition. We see this in an 
ungoverned family, rendered wretched and mis- 
erable merely from insubordination. In our 
cities lawlessness is understood to be an un- 
mitigated curse, transcending all other sources 
of mischief and wretchedness. 

Therefore it is that the leaders of a riot are 
shot and bayoneted in the public streets with- 
out mercy, and men feel that law and order are 
cheaply purchased even at this highest possi- 
ble sacrifice — human life. And it is only when 
riot and lawlessness are quelled, and law and 
order once more established, that good men 
breathe freely and sleep quietly and feel se- 
cure. So that on the whole the prevalence of 
law and order, and the submission of men to 
rightful authority, is felt to be the only safe- 
guard of the public welfare, and lawlessness 
and insubordination more to be dreaded than 
all other evils and miseries combined. 

Such is the way men feel and act when only 



Rebellion Must be Arrested, 75 

the welfare of a city of a few thousands is con- 
cerned. How ought God to feel when regard- 
ing the welfare of an endless universe in pre- 
cisely the same conditions? In this future 
and endless universe, only let all moral beings 
insist on having their own way, and refuse sub- 
mission to God's government- — as they will all 
be inclined to do — and be left unrestrained, 
and they would desolate it forever. Such a 
purpose of insubordination would run out into 
collision, discord, and general anarchy, whose 
results of mischief and misery would tran- 
scend all possibility of expression. In such 
circumstances the whole moral creation would 
become just a universal hell. Instead of the 
hell of the Bible — a single place of punish- 
ment for incorrigible offenders — the universe 
itself would be hell, in which lawlessness and 
discord would run riot, and the consequent 
suffering, agony, and torment become inde- 
scribable, uncontrollable, and eternal. 

This is why this inclination to lawlessness 
must be kept down, no matter at what sacri- 
fice, and why any thing that will accomplish 



76 The Endless Future. 



this becomes the merest dictate of benevo- 
lence. 

Here comes in the vital question, Will any 
thing do this? which leads to the considera- 
tion of the following chapter, 



The Appeal to Fear. 77 



Chapter VIII. 

THE APPEAL TO FEAR. 

WILL rebellion break out hereafter 
and forever? If not, why not? It 
appears undeniably true that there will be a 
tendency and temptation in all newly-created 
minds forever to break away from the re- 
straints of God's law and government. More- 
over, two out of the three orders of beings thus 
far created have in fact rejected his law and 
trampled on his authority. What is to pre- 
vent the future races of the universe from 
daring the same experiment? 

The two mightiest influences to prevent it, 
possible or conceivable, are appeals to fear 
and affection. The appeal to affection has been 
made in the sufferings and death of Jesus 
Christ for human salvation, the ultimate and 
even main design of which is not found, it is 
believed, in its relations to this world, but in 



78 The Endless Future. 



the fact of its being God's infinite plan and 
effort to bind the endless universe in obedience 
to himself. When Christ had "offered one 
sacrifice for sin," the apostle says, he "forever 
sat down on the right-hand of God " (Heb. x. 
12) — the first and final illustration to the uni- 
verse of God's mercy to the sinful, and his 
greatest, mightiest effort to bind that universe 
in loving obedience to himself hereafter and 
forever. Notice the expression: his mightiest 
effort — an effort so great, a motive so power- 
ful, as to be absolutely infinite; so that no ex- 
ertion of the Almighty in the direction of 
affection can possibly go beyond it. No more 
costly sacrifice is possible; no more precious 
offering, no greater evidence and exhibition of 
affection, possible to be made. " By this one 
offering he hath perfected forever them that 
are sanctified" (Heb. x. 14), and by this one 
offering he will draw all to himself who 
ever will be drawn; so that if a man rejects 
this, and refuses to be moved and affected by 
it, there is no hope in his case, for the divine 
resources in this direction are utterly ex- 



The Appeal to Fear. 79 

hausted; and therefore it is written: "He that 
believeth not the Son shall not see life, but 
the wrath of God abideth on him." (John 
iii. 36.) 

Now we are to notice the fact that the mo- 
tive oifear is also an indispensable element in 
God's government of the universe, and that it 
corresponds with the appeal to affection in be- 
ing God's mightiest effort to deter from sin ; so 
that nothing is left in this direction, and so 
that if any moral being refuses to be influ- 
enced by both, his case is utterly hopeless, and 
his salvation impossible. 

The point now to be especially noticed is 
that although the appeal to fear may not cor- 
respond with that of affection in comparative 
strength, yet it is like it in being entirely in- 
dispensable to the final result of obedience, and 
also in traveling on hand in hand with it for 
evermore. 

In ascertaining to how great an extent God 
will depend upon this motive of fear in the 
management of the future universe, we must 
look at his past, present, and future dealings 



80 The Endless Future. 

with sin, so far as they have been revealed, 
and draw our conclusions from this. Such a 
method of procedure is reliable, for God does 
not change. Neither is he governed by ca- 
price in the management of his universe, but 
acts ever upon settled, fundamental principles. 
We have therefore only to ascertain what his 
past and present plan is to know certainly what 
it will be in the future. 



The Appeal to Fear. 81 



Chapter IX, 

THE APPEAL TO FEAR (CONTINUED). 

GOD'S revealed dealings with sin past, pres- 
ent, and future. 

1. His past dealings with it. Yerily the rec- 
ord is a fearful one. God has held up himself 
to the gaze of the universe as a moral gov- 
ernor who will not allow his authority to be 
disregarded with impunity. 

Notice his dealings with the rebel angels. 
Says Jude 6: "The angels which kept not 
their first estate, but left their own habitation 
[alluding probably to some peculiarity of their 
probation], he hath reserved in everlasting 
chains under darkness unto the judgment of 
the great day." 

Says Peter (2 Pet. ii. 4) : " God spared not 

the angels that sinned, but cast them down to 

hell." Spared not — an expression designed 

doubtless to meet those who would insist that 

6 



82 The Endless Future. 

God was too good to punish, and would spare 
to inflict it. 

Our Saviour declares in Matthew xxv. 41 
that the everlasting fire was prepared origi- 
nally "for the devil and his angels." No lack 
of firmness and terribleness in dealing with 
the first sinners. 

How has he dealt with the sinners of this 
world in times past? He drowned the old 
world for its wickedness with the exception of 
a single family — swept the whole of them to 
destruction just because they were wicked. Is 
not God to be feared? 

He rained fire and brimstone upon Sodom 
and Gomorrah and the cities of the plain for 
their wickedness, and the Dead Sea to-day 
rolls over them. What is the meaning of it? 

He destroyed seven nations in the land of 
Canaan for the same reason. In one slaughter 
of them he "cast down upon them great stones 
from heaven even unto Azekah," so that more 
perished by the hail-stones than the sword; 
and the sun stood still in mid-heaven a whole 
day that the slaughter might be complete. 



The Appeal to Fear. 83 

And it was all for their wickedness; for the 
record, in Deuteronomy ix. 5, is: "For the 
wickedness of these nations the Lord thy God 
doth drive them out from before thee." Still 
stronger is the statement in Leviticus xviii. 25 : 
" The land is denied; therefore I do visit the in- 
iquity thereof upon it." I do it. It was not 
merely one nation dispossessing another, but 
God coming down upon them in righteous in- 
dignation for their wickedness. No lack of 
fearfulness in dealing with those nations for 
their sin. 

Then, too, he visited the wicked Israelites 
in the wilderness with pestilence and earth- 
quakes, and fire and fiery serpents, until only 
two out of the whole nation, over twenty years 
old when they left Egypt, remained alive. 
And this wholesale destruction all came upon 
them for their wickedness, and was God's di- 
rect and personal visitation. He has there- 
fore shown himself a fearful being whenever 
he has taken sin in hand in the past ages of 
the world and the universe. 

2. How is he dealing with it now ? What 



84 The Endless Future. 

appeal to fear does he now make in his treat- 
ment of it? The death that we all fear, and 
that shall erelong overtake us all, comes upon 
men for their sin, and is the animadversion of 
a righteous God upon the wickedness of the 
world. " Death passed upon all men, for that 
all have sinned." And "the sting of death is 
sin;" and all men, sooner or later, find it so. 

Furthermore, the appeal to fear is ringing 
in human ears in all the woes and miseries 
which God still makes to come on men for 
their wickedness. Take a few specimen quo- 
tations. Says Paul, in Romans i. 18: "The 
wrath of God is revealed from heaven against 
all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men." 
Says the prophet Ezra (viii. 22): "His power 
and his wrath is against all them that for- 
sake him." In accordance with this he has 
made this wicked world a slaughter-pen and 
a charnel-house — a world of tears and groans, 
and sufferings and death. He "visits the 
iniquity of the fathers upon the children." 
He makes "the way of transgressors hard;" 
and " the wages of sin is death " by his con- 



The Appeal to Fear. 85 

stant arrangement. " The face of the Lord is 
against them that do evil." "The way of the 
ungodly shall perish." "The curse of the 
Lord is in the house of the wicked." " Behold, 
the righteous shall be recompensed in the earth; 
much more the wicked and the sinner." 

Notice, also, the pains which God takes to 
portray himself personally before men in a 
fearful aspect. In Isaiah xxvi. 21: "Behold, 
the Lord cometh out of his place to punish the 
inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity." 
Also Deuteronomy xxxii. 35, 41: "To me be- 
longeth vengeance and recompense; their foot 
shall slide in due time, for the day of their ca- 
lamity is at hand, and the things that shall come 
upon them make haste. ... If I whet my 
glittering sword, and mine hand take hold on 
judgment, I will render vengeance to mine en- 
emies, and will reward them that hate me." 

And all the evils and sufferings of the world 
are his own personal visitation. " Shall there 
be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done 
it?" (Amos iii. 6.) And thus God is warning 
men in trumpet tones to beware of sin be- 



86 The Endless Future. 

cause of the judgments that he makes to fol- 
low it. 

But the most distinct and energetic appeal to 
fear is made by our Saviour himself, in Luke 
xii. 4, 5 : " Be not afraid of them that kill the 
body, and after that have no more that they 
can do. But I will forewarn you whom ye 
shall fear: Fear him which, after he hath 
killed, hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say 
unto you, Fear him." 

Also this expression, the wrath of God, as di- 
rected against sin, is used in the Bible no less 
than one hundred and twenty-six times, as any 
one may readily see by consulting a concord- 
ance. In fact, the pages of inspiration fairly 
blaze with the wrath of God against sin. And 
so with this appeal to fear God has been plying 
this world thus far with the very energies of 
omnipotence, and is pressing men with it now. 

3. We notice the appeal to fear in his treat- 
ment of sinners hereafter — not forever; we 
have not yet reached that. We only note the 
fact now that the finger of inspiration, pointing 
i little waif into the future, discloses still the 



The Appeal to Fear. 87 

Almighty dealing with the wicked in a fearful 
and terrible manner. John the Baptist came 
preaching in the wilderness of Judea, "Flee 
from the wrath to come.'''' And Paul, in 1 
Thessalonians i. 10, speaks of "Jesus, which 
delivered us from the wrath to come.'" That is a 
terrific expression, and it must refer to some- 
thing iu the future that is exceedingly dread- 
ful. We find also in Matthew xxv. 41, after 
the winding up of this world's history, and 
amid the revelations of the final judgment- 
day, that the Judge will say to those on the 
left-hand, "Depart from me, ye cursed, into 
everlasting fire." 

Also in Revelation xxi. 8 the declaration 
is: "But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the 
abominable, and murderers, and whoremon- 
gers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, 
shall have their part in the lake which burn- 
etii with fire and brimstone; which is the sec- 
ond death." 

And so, as Revelation gives us this last 
glimpse of the wicked as we peer a little tray 
into the future to ascertain their condition, we 



88 The Endless Future. 

see them only sinking in torment, and quail- 
ing beneath the heavy thunderbolts of God's 
wrath. Notice, it is the last glimpse, with 
nothing to relieve it — not a word intimating 
any change afterward ; not a syllable from 
Genesis to Revelation telling of any different 
experience in the future; not a ray of light in- 
deed from any source to relieve the dreadful 
darkness; and, to all appearance, a night of 
desolation, with no morn beyond it, is closing 
about them. What do we learn from this? 
Plainly this: that God will continue to deal 
with sinners in the future world, even as he 
has here, only with far greater severity; that 
he will array himself against them there with 
no less terrible energy than here; and even 
make a more clear, decided, and energetic ap- 
peal to fear by their punishment in the fut- 
ure world than he has made thus far in this. 
What depth and dreadfulness of meaning, 
therefore, to the infinite mind must there be 
in that compassionate appeal of God to sinful 
men: "O that they were wise, that they would 
consider their latter end ! " (Deut. xxxii. 29.) 



The Appeal to Fear. 89 



Chapter X, 

THE APPEAL TO FEAE (CONTINUED). 

^"^HE object of God in his fearful dealings 
- with the wicked. 

There is a reason for it. There is some good 
reason for his past, present, and future deal- 
ings with sinners in the way of judgment. 
God does not take this course with them with- 
out a serious and earnest purpose, as well as a 
distinct object in view. Notice again, in brief 
review, the terrible energy and persistency with 
which he has followed up this line of conduct. 
He drowned the old world; he destroyed Sod- 
om; he exterminated the Caananites; he slew 
the Israelites in the wilderness; his wrath is 
revealed from heaven now against all ungodli- 
ness and unrighteousness of men, and he will 
say to the wicked at the final judgment, " De- 
part, ye cursed." Now again, ivliy? Is it to 
gratify personal anger, personal revenge, per- 



90 The Endless Future. 

sonal spite ? Is it to make a vain exhibition 
of his power? If not, what? Why these 
fearful dealings? Is it a remedial agency — an 
effort to reform these wicked ones? The phy- 
sician's way to cure a man is not to kill him; 
that is not a remedial way of working. Then 
what is the object? Let the Bible answer, as 
it does in 2 Peter ii. 6: To make them "an 
example unto those that after should live un- 
godly." 

The record of Sodom and Gomorrah in Jude 
7 is that they " are set forth for an example" 
Also the record of the sinning Israelites in 
the wilderness in 1 Corinthians x. 6-11 is that 
all the calamities that came on them for their 
sinful conduct were to make them an example to 
as, teaching us that we should not " lust after 
evil things" as they did, nor be "idolaters" 
as they were, nor " commit fornication," nor 
" tempt Christ," nor " murmur,'' as they did; and 
" all these things " it says " happened unto them 
for examples, and are written for our admonition" 

Here notice that this punishment was in- 
flicted upon the sinners mentioned for the sake 



The Appeal to Fear. 91 

of those who should come after them. It was 
to prevent sin afterward, in future nations and 
races of the world, that the punishment was 
inflicted. Why, then, may not the punishment 
of the wicked in the next world be for the 
future races of the universe, and to keep them 
from apostasy? 

We find indeed that this is the exact use 
God will make of those judgments in the com- 
ing ages. Even the angels in heaven, we find, 
need the appeal to fear as well as affection. It 
is not enough that they gaze with wonder upon 
the glory and grandeur of redemption, and 
"desire to look into it." It is not enough for 
them to sing with the elders, "Worthy is the 
Lamb." It is not enough for them to be 
"ministering spirits sent forth to minister for 
them who shall be heirs of salvation." The 
record also is in Revelation xiv. 10 that the 
wicked should "be tormented in the presence 
of the holy angels, and in the presence of the 
Lamb." And here we repeat the question, 
Why in the presence of the angels, if this dread- 
ful sight is not necessary? Why necessary, 



92 The Endless Future. 

but for its moral effect upon them? What 
moral effect can be conceived but to keep them 
from apostasy? Why in the presence of the 
Lamb, but to indicate that judgment and mer- 
cy go hand in hand, and that with all his infi- 
nite affection he yet approves of this righteous 
judgment upon the wicked. For, although 
Christ will sit upon the throne of the universe 
as the great Redeemer, and the illustration to 
the universe forever of God's mercy to the 
sinful, yet the record in Revelation vi. 15, 16 is 
also this: "And the kings of the earth, and the 
great men, and the rich men, and the chief 
captains, and the mighty men, and every bond- 
man, and every free man, hid themselves in 
the dens and in the rocks of the mountains; 
and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on 
us, and hide us from the face of him that sit- 
teth on the throne, and from the wrath of the 
Lamb.'" 

And the prophecy of Isaiah closes with this: 
That in the coming ages, when the new heav- 
ens and the new earth shall have been inaugu- 
rated, "the hand of the Lord shall be known 



The Appeal to Fear. 93 

toward his servants, and his indignation toward 
his enemies. And they shall go forth and look 
upon the carcasses of the men that have trans- 
gressed against me; for their worm shall not 
die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and 
they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh." In 
this last expression we see the reason given 
for these fearful dealings of God with sinful 
men. It is to make wickedness abhorrent. It 
is to so hold it up to the gaze of the universe 
that all moral beings shall fear it — fear its con- 
sequences, and fear to commit it. And for 
this it is that in his past, present, and future 
dealings with sinners he is seen to be persist- 
ently executing upon them the fierceness of 
his anger. 



94 The Endless Future. 



Chapter XL 

THE APPEAL TO FEAR ETEENAL. 

HOW long will the appeal to fear con- 
tinue? The only possible answer is, 
Forever. For, 

1. What God has done and is doing he will 
always do in the administration of his moral 
government, for he changes not. If he has 
thus far governed by fear, then it is because 
this motive of fear is indispensable in moral 
government; and he can no more change his 
method of using it than he can change the 
moral nature of the being " made in his own 
image " and still keep him a moral being. And 
as the government he wields over him is just 
adapted to his nature, then if the nature is 
unchangeable in its elements, so must the gov- 
ernment be in the principles of its administra- 
tion. If, therefore, he has always governed 
by fear thus far, then he always must and will. 



The Appeal to Fear Eternal. 95 

Fear is an indispensable motive in the manage- 
ment of his universe. 

2. The appeal to fear will be needed forever. 
The moral universe will need it; every newly- 
created being will need it; for he wants to 
have his own way; and if he is not in some 
way deterred from choosing it, he will choose 
it. He is inclined to rebellion; and if he has 
no reason to fear rebellion, he will rebel. He 
is inclined to disobey God; and if he is not 
made to fear disobedience, and to fear him, 
he will disobey. He must in some way be 
made to understand the nature of sin, and 
the danger of committing it, or he will com- 
mit it. 

It is said here that the appeal to affection, 
made upon the mind of a newly-created be- 
ing, will be sufficient to prevent his sinning; 
that the exhibition of the love of God in Jesus 
Christ as a Saviour will draw him to obedi- 
ence, and so the motive of fear can be dis- 
pensed with. But the Saviour is a Saviour 
from sin and its consequences; and if he knows 
nothing of these, the word Saviour can have 



96 The Endless Future. 

no meaning for him; and so the appeal to this 
mightiest of motives be impossible. 

Now, how he can be best brought to the 
knowledge of what sin is, both in its nature 
and its consequences — what the details of that 
process of education and illustration need to 
be to make this revelation to him so that he 
will understand it, and feel it, and be moved 
by it, we know not. We only know that he 
must in some way be made to fear sin and its 
consequences; and that in order to create this 
fear in the universe God has dealt with sin- 
ners in righteous judgment, and then made 
them an example to those who should come 
after them ; and we see also that such an ap- 
peal will be always needed, even as the tend- 
ency to rebellion will be eternal. 

3. Those who have broken away from God 
in these incipient stages of the moral universe 
have set the example of rebellion before an 
endless universe; and that example will cer- 
tainly be followed unless the transgressors be 
so dealt with as to prevent it. The influence 
of that example will be felt forever unless 



The Appeal to Fear Eternal. 97 

thoroughly and completely counteracted. How 
it can thus be counteracted by any punishment 
less than unlimited, it is impossible to see; 
for if punishment be limited, then the time 
will come when there will be no punishment, 
and then the next race of beings created will 
not only have no present and tangible evidence 
of the evil consequences of transgression, but 
the sole record of the past will be that those 
who dared rebellion were only temporarily 
punished, and that the infliction is passed, an<£ 
is all over with, and that, with the exception 
of this comparatively brief endurance of suf- 
fering, they are as well off now as if they had 
never sinned. It is very easy to see that 
such dealings with the sinful would have very 
little influence in the way of motive to coun- 
teract their evil example, and very little tend- 
ency to deter others from a similar rebell- 
ion; which leads to another point somewhat 
similar. 

4. That as an appeal to fear no threatening 
of punishment less than endless would have 
any influence to prevent sin; for the universe 



98 The Endless Future. 

of moral beings would reason hereafter just 
as wicked men do in this world who assume 
limited penalty, and therefore make no effort 
to stop sinning. They reason in this way: If 
penalty be limited, then it will end some time, 
and there will be an eternity of happiness be- 
yond it, in comparison with which all limited 
punishment will become at length an infini- 
tesimal — absolutely nothing; and therefore the 
threatening of such punishment as a motive to 
deter from sin will be worthless. 

We may be sure, therefore, that such pun- 
ishment God does not threaten; for he means 
to make men truly fear sin and fear him. And 
so when the Saviour says, " Fear him who is 
able to destroy both soul and body in hell; 
yea, I say unto you, Fear him," we may be 
sure he meant to threaten something that is 
truly fearful and dreadful, and therefore some- 
thing more than mere limited penalty, which 
would have almost no effect to deter from sin, 
and be of no value any way. 

5. Penalty must be limited or unlimited. 
Assume limited penalty, and then to the Infi- 



The Appeal to Fear Eternal. 99 

nite Mind there would, in all probability, re- 
sult two things: 

First. That, as it must end some time, the 
next race of beings created after that would 
certainly rebel. Then they must be punished; 
and when their punishment was ended the next 
race after them would rebel, and then the next 
and the next; and so sin and punishment be 
the law of the universe forever, and not a sin- 
gle moral being be established in eternal obedi- 
ence to God — sin always entering and defiling 
the universe of God forever. 

Secondly. It may also be certain to the Infi- 
nite Mind that these same ones who had sinned 
and been punished, and who had reached the 
end of their punishment, would, upon some 
other demand of his that crossed their natural 
inclinations, rebel again — their second rebellion 
to be followed again by limited punishment; 
and so the process of sinning and being pun- 
ished keep on thus through all the ages, and 
the result after all be the same dreadful fact 
which encumbers the orthodox system— end- 
less suffering — the universe revolving in an 



100 The Endless Future. 

endless cycle of sin and punishment, suffering 
and confusion, and, unlike the evangelical sys- 
tem, securing no substantial results of holiness 
and happiness, or the final and certain salva- 
tion of a single individual. 

Such, on the ground of mere reason, would 
be the possible — and even probable — effect of 
limited punishment ; and nothing result from it, 
to the universe of God, but endless and hope- 
less disaster, and God's government over it 
deserve, for its incompetency and inefficiency, 
infinite contempt. 

We see, therefore, how unlimited or endless 
punishment, dreadful as it is, may yet be in- 
evitable, and merciful even, on the ground of 
human reason. But, 

6. The Bible settles the matter in the most 
clear and unequivocal language. It says ex- 
pressly (Jude 6) that the rebel angels are 
kept in "everlasting" chains — living witnesses 
to the universe forever of the danger of diso- 
beying God. 

And the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomor- 
rah were not merely overwhelmed by the fiery 



y 



The Appeal to Fear Eternal. 101 

storm, but, as Jude says, " are set forth for an 
example, suffering the vengeance of eternal 
fire" — an endless exhibition of the wrath of 
God against sin, making them, as Peter says 
(2 Pet. ii. 6), "an example unto those that after 
should live ungodly," a convincing proof for- 
ever that all who "live ungodly" shall meet 
with a similar retribution. 

And of all the finally impenitent the record 
in Matthew xxv. 46 is: "These shall go away 
into everlasting punishment; but the righteous 
into everlasting life." Here notice this verse 
in particular. If the "life" of the righteous 
be endless, and the "punishment" of the wick- 
ed be not endless, then, in this verse, the same 
word, and in the same connection, is applied 
to things between which there is an infinite 
difference — an absurdity and inconsistency in 
the use of language which has no parallel in 
the weakest of mere human productions. 

Now, is it conceivable that the Lord Jesus 
Christ, speaking to men on the stupendous 
themes of judgment and eternity, could have 
been so inconsiderate, and even careless, in the 



102 The Endless Future. 

use of language? It seems inconsistent and 
impossible. And if it be so, then the only- 
possible conclusion is that the life of the right- 
eous and the punishment of the wicked must 
both be endless. 

Also, if there be no such thing as endless 
punishment, and the idea is a mere figment of 
the human brain, with no foundation in real- 
ity, then the honesty and fairness of the Sav- 
iour in the use of such language cannot be 
defended; for if the doctrine of endless pun- 
ishment be not taught in these and similar ex- 
pressions used by him, then the idea cannot be 
conveyed in the language in which the New 
Testament was written. Even more than this: 
He professed to be revealing things beyond 
human knowledge, and knew that his word 
would be authority upon the realities of the 
coming future; and to seek thus to frighten 
men by such representations of hell and pun- 
ishment, when they have no foundation in fact, 
is dreadful and inexcusable trifling. And the 
Son of God did not trifle. 

No other conclusion, therefore, is possible, 



The Appeal to Fear Eternal. 103 

on the ground of both reason and revelation, 
than that the doom of the finally impenitent is 
endless perdition. 

We reach this conclusion only because com- 
pelled to by the argument, because all the evi- 
dence in the case points in this one direction 

— THE FINAL AND ETEENAL PERDITION OF UN- 
GODLY MEN. 



PART SECOND 



Chapter I, 

FOUR DISTINCT LINES OF ARGUMENT. 

THE two fundamental principles in the 
foregoing view differing from theological 
teaching generally are: The infancy of the 
moral system, and the position that the oc- 
casion of sin lies ever in the nature of free- 
agency under the necessary restraint of law, 
and belongs to all moral beings who either 
have been or can be created. 

These principles are far-reaching in their 
application, and modify essentially some prom- 
inent doctrines of dogmatic theology as ordi- 
narily taught, and especially clear away diffi- 
culties and objections belonging to the ortho- 
dox scheme. It is not proposed, however, in 
this connection to apply these principles be- 
yond the particular subject of discussion. 

I. Endless suffering not unreasonable. 

We take a lower position first, thus : The ex- 

(107) 



108 The Endless Future. 

igencies of the moral system demand the pres- 
ent infliction of suffering; and suffering, too, 
inflicted and endured to a very great extent 
for the good of others; and no one is compe- 
tent to say how long these exigencies may con- 
tinue. For aught any one can say to the con- 
trary, they may continue always; and there- 
fore the unreasonableness of endless suffering 
cannot be demonstrated. 

II. No punishment less than endless would cor- 
respond icith the magnitude and enormity of sin. 

One reason why men have such low and in- 
adequate views of the future punishment of 
sin is their erroneous and superficial ideas of 
sin itself. They estimate it in the light of 
their own partial and prejudiced conceptions 
of it, instead of by its real enormity and ill- 
desert. How ought sin to be estimated? An- 
swer: By the being sinned against, the law 
broken, and the universe assailed by it. 

1. The being sinned against. Sin is com- 
mitted against the Infinite God — a God of in- 
finite greatness aud holiness and worth; and 
in this view its magnitude and heinousness 



Four Distinct Lines of Argument. 109 

cannot be measured, and the punishment of it 
should correspond. 

2. The law broken. It is contempt for that 
law which is the transcript of the Infinite 
Jehovah, and on whose inviolability and sa- 
credness the welfare of the whole moral uni- 
verse forever is depending; and therefore its 
ill-desert is beyond measure, and the penalty 
should correspond. 

3. The universe it assails. It assails the 
happiness of a universe endless in duration, 
boundless in extent, and limitless in value; 
and in this view, its enormity and ill-desert 
cannot be measured; and therefore also the 
punishment that adequately measures it must 
be itself limitless. 

No punishment, therefore, less than endless 
would correspond with the magnitude, hei- 
nousness, and ill-desert of sin. 

III. The proper education of the moral universe 
demands endless penalty for sin. 

God's dealings with sin must determine the 
views of his moral universe respecting it. 

1. Suppose him to threaten no penalty at all 



110 The Endless Future. 

for sin. Then he would, in effect, say to all 
moral beings that sin is in his estimation an 
insignificant matter, not worth noticing; that 
his own honor and glory, which it despises and 
tramples on, are of no consequence; and that 
the welfare and happiness of the endless uni- 
verse of being which it assails are of no con- 
cern with him. In short, that he had no 
preference for holiness over sin, inasmuch as 
in that case he would treat them both alike; 
and this would be a stupendous falsehood. 

2. Suppose him to threaten limited penalty 
for sin. Then he would say in effect to his 
moral creation that sin is in his estimation a 
matter of limited and inferior magnitude and 
heinousness, when, as we have seen, it is not 
and cannot be. 

Also, that he had only a limited and tempo- 
rary regard for his own character and position 
in the estimation of his subjects, or for the 
welfare of the endless universe of being of 
which he is the responsible guardian. And 
thus he would educate his whole moral crea- 
tion to low and inadequate conceptions both of 



Four Distinct Lines of Argument. Ill 

himself and his government. It would, in 
short, be a proclamation to the universe for- 
ever that the great God of heaven had only a 
limited amount of self-respect, and entertained 
but a limited apprehension of the value of 
eternal interests, and which manifestly de- 
mand unlimited consideration. 

Also, the value of obedience in the endless 
universe would become in their estimation 
limited and inferior, when it is not and cannot 
be, and when its value, as we have seen, tran- 
scends all finite expression; and sin would be- 
come in their apprehension a mere limited 
and temporary mischief, when, in" such a uni- 
verse, it is not and cannot be. And thus all 
their fundamental conceptions of God and his 
government and his universe, of holiness and 
sin — the blessedness of one and the mischief 
of the other — would become erroneous and 
untruthful. In this view, therefore, limited 
penalty is an impossibility, and limitless or 
endless penalty, as the proper and neces- 
sary threatening against sin, becomes inevita- 
ble. 



112 The Endless Future. 

IY. The harmony of the divine administration 
necessitates endless penalty. 

God is building a vast moral edifice, and, 
as a wise master-builder, will certainly so con- 
struct it as that it shall be perfectly harmonious 
in all its parts and proportions. For example, 
the reward promised to obedience must corre- 
spond perfectly with the mighty meaning and 
import of obedience to the commands of the In- 
finite Jehovah. It must correspond, too, with 
the value of obedience in an endless universe 
— a universe stretching through endless ages, 
and doubtless eternally expanding. It must do 
this. The government would fail to be a per- 
fect one if it did not. And no limited reward 
could adequately express the obligation of 
obedience to such a being, or the value of obe- 
dience in such a universe. 

But this reasoning applies with equal close- 
ness to the opposite sanction of penalty. 
This, too, must have its exact correspondence 
with all the conditions of a perfect govern- 
ment, an endless universe, and an Infinite God. 
If obedience be a measureless good, so is dis- 



Four Distinct Lines of Argument. 113 

obedience a measureless mischief ; and as 
nothing but eternal reward will correspond 
with the value of the one, so nothing but end- 
less penalty will correspond with the evil of 
the other; and as sure, therefore, as God must 
promise the one, he must also threaten, and if 
necessary execute, the other. 

Furthermore, every thing appertaining to this 
moral edifice is limitless and endless. The 
God that builds it is endless. The system it- 
self is endless. The law that protects it is 
endless. The reward of obedience is endless. 
The great atonement by Jesus Christ is un- 
limited both in its nature and relations. And 
how, then, can the penalty for sin be limited 
and finite, without becoming at once inharmo- 
nious and inconsistent? The fact is, the four 
great pillars upon which the divine adminis- 
tration rests — law, reward, penalty, and the 
atonement — each and all of them, stretch away 
at every point into the infinite, all towering 
harmoniously together in their infinite and 
majestic proportions ; and if you shrink any 
one of them to the dimensions of the finite, 



114 The Endless Future. 

you make it at once inharmonious, inconsist- 
ent, and impossible. 

The harmony, therefore, of the vast moral 
edifice which Gfod is building demands end- 
less penalty as the only proper sanction of the 
divine law, and the execution of it at last upon 
all the finally impenitent absolutely essential 
to its perfection. 



Argument With the Restorationists. 115 



Chapter II. 

AEGUMENT WITH THE KESTOKATIONISTS. 

AS a matter of fact, sin has invaded the 
universe of God. Therefore, it becomes 
a serious and practical question: What shall 
be done with the sinner? Evidently something 
must be done with him. He is a factor in the 
universe which cannot be ignored, or even neg- 
lected.* 

The fallen angels have rebelled against God, 
and are doing their utmost to oppose him and 
his government. The mass of sinners in this 
world are desperate in their wickedness. They 
hate the restraints of his law and government, 
and will not submit to them. They reject the 
dictates of reason and conscience, and will not 
be guided by them. Even in this Christian 
land "they have no fear of God before their 
eyes." They neglect his Bible, misspend his 
Sabbaths, and trample on all gospel privileges. 



116 The Endless Future. 

Multitudes riot in intemperance ard sensual- 
ity. As the apostle expresses it, " They walk 
after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness." (2 
Pet. ii. 10.) In our cities, especially, they can 
be heard on every street-corner blaspheming 
the name of God and of his Son Jesus Christ. 
A man has been known to curse the Almighty 
to his face as a tyrant, and call upon the 
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, each by name, 
in language of blasphemous execration. 

On the other hand, Col. IngersolL treats sin 
and holiness and retribution with levity, and 
finds his pastime in exciting the merriment of 
a popular audience over the tremendous real- 
ities of death, judgment, and eternity. These 
are mentioned as illustrations of the deepest 
desperation in wickedness. 

Now, what shall be done with such hereafter ? 
Answer: One of four tilings — they must either 
be changed in character, as the Restoration- 
ists hold, or be annihilated, or be left unre- 
strained in their wickedness forever, or be 
confined forever. We notice them in their 
order. 



Argument With the Restorationists. 117 

The bestobation of the wicked in a fut- 
ube state is impossible. 

The Restorationists assume that sinful char- 
acter will be changed in the future world. How 
shall it be done? If done at all, it would seem 
that it must be by some one o£ the following 
instrumentalities : either by the mere event of 
death; or through the influence of suffering; 
or by the immediate exertion of divine power; 
or by some new application of the atonement; 
or by a more favorable probation; or by the 
use of stronger motives to right action. 

1. Sinful character not changed by the event of 
death. 

Those who assume that it will be, assume 
the occasion of sin to be in the body; so that 
in parting with the body the man parts with 
the occasion of sinning. But suppose the oc- 
casion of sin not to be a physical one at all, and 
to have no dependence upon the body, and to 
originate solely in the nature of the mind it- 
self — in its love of conscious freedom, as has been 
already shown. The desire to have my own 
way without restraint is manifestly not in the 



118 The Endless Future. 

body. The body is merely the instrument 
through which the inclination of the soul to 
have its own way is gratified — through which 
it acts out itself. And this union of the soul 
with the body is apparently only designed to 
subject the soul to restraints and crosses, to 
curb its imperiousness through limitation and 
confinement, and so to hinder its outworkings ; 
and is designed only to work against sin. 

Undoubtedly without a body the inclination 
to independence and willful indulgence would 
be the same as now, and work out itself ener- 
getically and disastrously in some form, even 
as it is now working itself out in the devil and 
his angels. Indeed, some of the vilest of hu- 
man passions — like pride, selfishness, avarice, 
ambition, envy, hatred, covetousness, and re- 
venge — seem to be not at all dependent on the 
body, and even to have no connection with it, 
except, in some instances, to work themselves 
oat through the body. 

Also, what has the body to do with the sin 
of forgetting God, or of rebellion against his 
government, or the rejection of the Saviour? 



Argument With the Restorationists. 119 

To all appearance, nothing. The event of 
death, therefore, will only apparently aggra- 
vate sin. It will sunder the bonds which have 
partially restrained it, and deliver it from the 
hinderances and obstructions of the mortal 
state, and in this way intensify the love of in- 
dependent action, by giving to the soul a freer 
scope and a wider range and a more unre- 
stricted exercise of all sinful tendencies, and 
will only aggravate instead of reforming the 
sinful character. 

2. Sinful character not changed by suffering. 

Suffering alone has no power to reform char- 
acter, and at best only leads the sinner to give 
up the external act of sin which causes the 
suffering, the character at the bottom remain- 
ing essentially unchanged. In the case of the 
few who become Christians, suffering appears 
first to arrest the man in his career of thought- 
lessness and compel reflection; and then the 
Divine Spirit of God, gently knocking at the 
door of the heart, in a few instances obtains 
admittance. The man yields to the Spirit's 
influence, and submits to God, and is said to 



120 The Endless Future. 

be "born of the Spirit." But in the vast ma- 
jority of cases the door is kept persistently 
closed against his gentle knockings. The suf- 
fering is endured without submission. The 
man resists the Spirit, and refuses to yield; 
and the result is only increased hardness and 
impenitence. Suffering brought Pharaoh to 
temporary submission and external obedience, 
but it effected no true reformation of character, 
and prod uced no love to God. The best that suf- 
fering ever does of itself is to sometimes induce 
a man to abandon his vicious practices. But, 

Secondly, in the vast majority of cases it 
does not even do that. And even in those 
cases, where the suffering is seen to come di- 
rectly from the sinful indulgence it does not 
at all lead the sufferer to give up the sin. 

For example: Take those forms of sinful 
indulgence which are followed by the most 
dreadful sufferings sin ever inflicts on men — 
intemperance and licentiousness. The drunk- 
ard's life is often one of almost incessant tor- 
ment — torment of body and torment of mind 
— and yet he clings to the sinful habit with 



Argument With the Restorationists. 121 

the very strength of desperation. The record 
of licentiousness is no less appalling. Backs 
and dungeons and flames are not more terrible 
than the sufferings which irregular passion 
often inflicts; and yet, in spite of all, the 
wretched victims hug their habits of beastly 
impurity with steadily increasing frenzy. So 
the gambler and the miser become so infatu- 
ated in their wickedness as to be utterly reck- 
less of consequences; and no amount of suf- 
fering and privation has the least influence to 
wean them from their vice. But, 

Thirdly, suffering does not even have a tend- 
ency to change character. Indeed, it far of tener 
hardens than softens, and even always hardens, 
except in the case of the few who become true 
Christians. Neither bodily anguish, nor the 
pangs of bereavement, nor the emptiness of dis- 
appointment, nor the torments of remorse, nor 
all combined, lead men to give up their world- 
liness, and to love and serve God; and in the 
vast majority of cases only embitter them 
more and more against God, and incite to ad- 
ditional complaint and rebellion. 



122 The Endless Future. 

And this accords with the Bible. Revela- 
tion ix. 20, 21 reads: "And the rest of the men 
which were not killed by these plagues yet 
repented not of the works of their hands; nei- 
ther repented they of their murders, nor of 
their fornication, nor of their theft." 

Also, Revelation xvi. 8, 11: "And men were 
scorched with great heat, and blasphemed the 
name of God, which hath power over these 
plagues; and they repented not to give him 
glory. And they gnawed their tongues for 
pain, and blasphemed the God of heaven be- 
cause of their pains and their sores, and re- 
pented not of their deeds." 

And yet multitudes assume that suffering is 
to be the grand panacea in the future world 
for the reformation of character. But why 
any more efficacious there than here? And if 
it fails here, why not there ? The principles of 
moral government cannot change; the laws of 
mind cannot change; and how, then, can the 
suffering which was powerless here to renovate 
character become omnipotent there? 

The assumption, therefore, that suffering in 



Argument With the Bestorationists. 123 

the future world will break up sinful habit, 
contradicts all our observation here in this 
world. Here evidently the mass of men resist 
it all. Notwithstanding all the suffering they 
encounter, they force their headlong and head- 
strong way to still deeper depths in sin, and 
to an ever-increasing distance from God and 
holiness. And how feeble must mere suffering 
be to reform men hereafter who have resisted, 
through a whole life-time, the steady pressure 
of this earthly probation. The fact is, the 
reformation of character by mere suffering is 
impossible, not merely in this world, but any- 
where in God's universe. The very nature of 
mind forbids it. 

Moreover, let it be noticed that in securing 
the reformation of a sinner, suffering is only a 
single element employed. To lead the sinner 
to give up his sinfulness and submit to God, 
requires goodness with severity, and that, too, 
in the most caref ul combination. It requires 
kindness to be mingled with chastisement, mak- 
ing "the way of the transgressor hard" on the 
one hand, and yet at the same time enduring 



124 The Endless Future. 

him with patience and long-suffering on the 
other — just that nice and delicate adjustment 
of reformatory influences to his peculiar nat- 
ure and disposition, which especially charac- 
terizes his earthly probation. 

Also, there is needed in addition to this, and 
in connection with it, the infinite influences of 
God's Holy Spirit, exerted in just that way 
and to just that extent which shall induce and 
persuade to the utmost without, in the least 
degree, interfering with free agency. The 
man must be induced to "work out his own 
salvation " with absolute freedom, while at the 
same time " God works in him " by his Holy 
Spirit. And this entire combination of good- 
ness and severity and the Spirit's influences 
must be set in operation and kept in operation 
with all the energy and intensity, and at the 
same time with all the carefulness, which the 
God of heaven can command, in order to save 
even a single sinner. It takes the mighty 
power of God to save a man. This is why the 
divine power in conversion is likened by the 
apostle to the power exerted in raising Christ 



Argument With the JRestorationists. 125 

from the dead (Eph. i. 19, 20); and why God 
says of himself, "What could have been done 
more to my vineyard that I have not done in 
it." (Isa. v. 4) And it is just this nice ad- 
justment, this delicate combination 'of reform- 
atory influences, and this infinite intensity of 
operation on the part of the Divine Spirit, 
which goes to make up this earthly probation. 

And therefore the question returns, What 
can mere suffering do to reform a man hereaft- 
er, who has resisted through a whole life-time 
the steady pressure of such a probation. 

3. Sinful character not changed by the exertion 
of divine power. 

The word power is here used in the sense of 
force; not, as under the preceding head, in the 
sense of exertion. The supposition of the di- 
vine creation of holiness by power is absurd 
and impossible. No man can make either a 
good or bad character for himself but himself 
Because a good character is made up of love 
and obedience to God; and God cannot love 
for us, nor choose for us, nor exercise faith for 
us, nor do our work of repentence. This is 



126 The Endless Future. 

our work, and we alone can do it. And to the 
doing of this work God can only lead us and 
induce us by moral considerations — the only 
influences proper to be used with a moral be- 
ing. Motives only can move the soul to right 
action, and to a change of character; and 
these, accompanied by the Holy Spirit to give 
them efficacy, constitute the entire possible 
agency of God in the reformation of character; 
and these, as we shall see hereafter, are used 
in this world to the full extent they can wisely 
and properly be. 

4. Sinful character not changed by some new 
application of the atonement. 

Christ can be no better Saviour in the future 
world than here; for he is "the same yester- 
day, to-day, and forever." (Heb. xii. 8.) 

He can never die again; for says the apostle 
in Romans vi. 9: "Christ being raised from 
the dead, dieth no more; death hath no more 
dominion over him." 

Neither can his atoning sacrifice have any 
greater efficacy there than here; for here it 
"cleanses from all sin;" and he is "able to 



Argument With the Eestorationists. 127 

save them to the uttermost that come unto God 
by him." (1 John i. 7; Heb. vii. 25.) 

Is it said that in the future world the sinner 
will be less disposed to reject him? But why? 
He clearly understands now that Christ died 
in his behalf — as clearly as language can ex- 
press it; and the fact can never be stated any 
more clearly. 

The invitations of the gospel are as full, free, 
and hearty here as they ever can be elsewhere. 

All of God's providential dealings are aimed 
at inducing men to accept them, and we know 
of no new and improved dealings which could 
be devised, and of nothing that could increase 
the efficacy of those already employed. 

Also, the blessings promised on condition of 
accepting him cannot be multiplied in num- 
ber, or increased in value and attractiveness; 
nor can the warnings against rejecting him be 
any more fearful than they are. 

Notice, furthermore, that the very object of 
his mission was to rescue men from sin. He 
says of himself (Luke xix. 10): "The Son of 
man is come to seek and to save that which was 



128 The Endless Future. 



lost" He came on purpose for this. He came 
on purpose to reform men. He suffered and 
died for this. Now is it supposable that he 
would omit airy instrumentality which might 
be made effective for this? Why should he? 
If his mission was to reform and save, why 
should he prosecute it with half-heartedness, 
and leave out instrumentalities which might 
be successfully employed? Why omit any 
thing ? The supposition that he did would be 
inexplicable. It would convict him of unfaith- 
fulness to his mission — to the trust reposed 
in him — to the work God sent him to do. 

Therefore we are bound to believe, on com- 
mon sense principles, that when he came on 
purpose to save sinners, he did the best that 
could be done. We should expect this from an 
ordinary man of ordinary honesty and faith- 
fulness; how much more from the infinite Sav- 
iour! But if the best is done on earth, then 
nothing remains that he can employ any more 
successfully hereafter, 



Argument With the Restorationists. 129 



oter III. 



argument with the restorationists 
(continued). 

SINFUL character is not changed by a more 
favorable probation. 

The position of men in this world is often 
regarded as being encumbered with frightful 
obstacles to right living and acting — obstacles, 
too, which they themselves had no hand in 
forming, and for which they are in no way re- 
sponsible. For example: 

Overlooking the fact that the occasion of sin 
is found in the necessary nature of free agen- 
cy, they have undertaken to account for the 
certainty and universality of human sinfulness 
by tracing it to the external conditions of hu- 
man probation; for instance, to the temptation 
of malignant beings, or the connection of the 
soul with a material body, or to the conditions 
of infancy, or to the parental relation; thus 
9 



130 The Endless Future. 

throwing the responsibility for the sinfulness 
of men off from them, and onto these partic- 
ular arrangements of which God is represent- 
ed as being the responsible author. Mani- 
festly, those who entertain such views cannot 
see how it is possible that men have in this 
world and this life a fair probation. 

In the minds of such, therefore, the assump- 
tion of & future probation is entirely consistent 
and logical, being necessary, in their appre- 
hension, to make up for these previously in- 
flicted evils, these hinderances to holy living; 
and being necessary also to vindicate the Di- 
vine benevolence in the arrangements of this 
world. 

The present design is to show that the entire 
conditions of human probation are in the in- 
terest of holiness. 

We have seen that the tendency to self-will 
originates in the love of conscious freedom, 
and, under the necessary restraints of law, is 
prone to become impatient and imperious, and 
to lead to actual sin. 

The object now will be briefly to indicate 



Argument With the Restorationists. 131 

how all the conditions of human probation 
have apparently been so devised as either to 
repress this tendency, or favorably to modify 
its outworkings ; and thus to lead men, if pos- 
sible, to abandon sin and enter on a life of 
holy obedience to God; in short, that human 
probation is the best possible for securing both 
holiness and salvation, so that a future one 
would be useless. 

I. Temptation by malignant beings. 

We notice this first because, as it lies in 
some minds, it is an objection to the justice of 
endless punishment — God permitting men to 
be tempted to sin, and then punishing them for 
following the temptation. How is this to be 
met? 

1. A Personal Devil. — Some deny his ex- 
istence. But no truth is more clearly revealed 
in the Bible. His existence, fall, and punish- 
ment are as clearly revealed as any Biblical 
fact whatever. 

Also, that he ranges this world to tempt 
men is revealed with equal clearness. "Your 
adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh 



132 The Endless Future, 

about, seeking whom he may devour." (1 Pet. 
v. 8.) 

But, says the objector, the devil is powerful 
as well as malignant, and has uncontrolled 
sway over men; and the weakness of human 
nature is unequally matched against the cun- 
ning, daring, and desperation of such an an- 
tagonist. 

This contradicts the whole tenor of the 
Scriptures. They ever represent him as being 
completely under the Divine control, and that 
his devilish malignity is ever held firmly in 
check. In his trial of Job, God said to him on 
two occasions, "You may go just so far, and 
no farther;" and the devils could not even de- 
stroy a herd of swine without the permission 
of the Saviour. 

2. Temptation in Eden. — Why was this 
permitted? 

(1) For one thing, doubtless, to save Adam 
from a sin which would otherwise have bound 
him to hopeless retribution. In the view we 
are taking, he would have sinned any way, 
sinned as soon as the restraints of law crossed 



Argument With the Restored ionists. 133 

his inclinations — sinned for the same reason 
that the devil did. And this would have been 
a determination to abandon God, and defy 
his authority, as deliberate and willful and 
wicked as such a determination could then be 
— even just such a sin as the devil himself com- 
mitted — and which might have thrown him, as 
it did the devil, beyond the reach of mercy and 
forgiveness. And so, in all probability, to save 
him from this, for one thing, God permitted 
the devil to act out his malignity in tempting 
him, and thus to divide with him, as it were, 
the burden of criminality. And this diminu- 
tion of conscious guilt was the apparent result; 
for Adam charges his sin in part upon the wom- 
an, and she again upon the tempter; and it 
should be especially noticed that the sentence 
is pronounced accordingly, by far the heaviest 
curse falling upon the latter as being the prime 
instigator of the rebellion. 

(2) Another probable design was to make re- 
pentance possible by saving from despair. 
The most deliberate and high-handed sinning 
appears to throw the one committing it beyond 



134 The Endless Future, 

the possibility of repentance. His sin blazes 
so terribly before him that the confidence in 
God necessary to repentance cannot be awak- 
ened within him. Hence it is said of certain 
that "it is impossible to renew them to repent- 
ance" (Heb. vi. 4-6); and for those who "sin 
willfully" there is only "a certain fearful look- 
ing for of judgment." (Heb. x. 26, 27.) Why 
is the devil hopeless? Answer: Doubtless be- 
cause his iron despair precludes the possibility 
of confidence in God, and he dare not hope for 
mercy, and is bound thus, by the very nature 
of his sin, to confirmed and hopeless impeni- 
tence. Had our first parents been permitted 
to sin as he did, no reason appears why their 
sin would not have been followed by a like re- 
sult. 

(3) Another probable reason for permitting 
this temptation was that without it the plan of 
redemption would have been unavailing. Of 
what use would redemption be to beings con- 
firmed in impenitence ? If provided for them 
they would not accept it, which is the proba- 
ble reason why no provisions of grace were 



Argument With the Restorationists. 135 

made for the angels, while for our ruined race 
there is wrought out so great salvation. 
(Heb. ii. 16, Revised Version.) And so we 
reach the conclusion: Temptation possibly neces- 
sary to the efficacy of redemption. 

3. Temptation Generally. — This is per- 
mitted now only for the purpose, apparently, 
of modifying favorably the conditions of hu- 
man probation. 

(1) It should be kept in mind that sin is 
not due primarily to temptation by malignant 
beings; for, in the view we are taking, mankind 
would, sooner or later, sin any way, from their 
own love of independence; so that this tempta- 
tion does not originate the sin. 

(2) We have no reason for supposing that 
Satan is ever permitted so to tempt men that 
they have not abundant ability to resist him. 
In the case of Christians we know they are 
not thus tempted: "God is faithful, who will 
not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are 
abler (1 Cor. x. 13.) 

(3) This peculiar temptation now, as in 
Eden, undoubtedly diminishes the ill-desert of 



136 The Endless Future. 

human sinfulness, softens in the human mind 
the conviction of criminality, and makes peni- 
tence a more hopeful matter; and is permit- 
ted, in the case of each individual, only in that 
way and to that extent which will best work 
to save him. 

(4) Even in case a man follows the tempta- 
tions of the adversary, and goes down with 
him to perdition, it may still be true that this 
fact of his temptation will mitigate the tor- 
ment of his unending remorse. 

(5) In the case of the Christian it will, if re- 
sisted, toughen and consolidate Christian prin- 
ciple, and build up a character of solidity and 
permanence. "Blessed is the man that endur- 
eth temptation." (James i. 12.) 

(6) It secures in him watchfulness and 
carefulness. A man alone in the wilderness, 
exposed to the attacks of savages and wild 
beasts, is ever on the alert, and literally "works 
out his salvation with fear and trembling," 
just as men are now exhorted to work out their 
spiritual salvation, as the only way to escape 
the wiles of Satan. 



Argument With the Eestorationisis. 137 

(7) The knowledge of this fact will also 
greatly stimulate to prayer for Divine help, and 
the petition, "Lead us not into temptation," 
will have a depth and a meaning impossible 
without it; and the soul be driven, as the only 
refuge, to a closer companionship with God. 

Let no man, therefore, reproach that benig- 
nant providence under which man is assailed 
by the temptation of malignant beings, knowing 
that God has permitted it solely in the interest 
of salvation. So much for the matter of temp- 
tation. Now, 

II. The connection of the soul with a physical 
body. 

Some think of this only as a calamity. They 
imagine that sin originates in the bodily appe- 
tites and passions, while the fact is that the 
independent soul in sinning is only seeking 
its own way through these. The soul itself, de- 
termined on self-indulgence, is the great seat 
of the sinfulness; and God is only seeking, 
apparently, by its confinement in the physical 
body, to curb its imperiousness, to restrain 
self-will, and to cross, repress, discipline, and 



138 The Endless Future. 

subdue its energy and activity. For why, ex- 
cept for this, should he cramp the mighty soul, 
with force enough in it to energize a world, 
into a diminutive human body? Why compel 
it to a slow and tedious locomotion in company 
with that body, when it might as well have 
had the speed of the lightning? Why furnish 
it with only five senses, through which to get 
its knowledge, when, to all appearance, it 
might as well have had a thousand? Mani- 
festly the grand object is confinement, repres- 
sion, and limitation, and undoubtedly that, 
through this experience, the man may the 
more easily learn the great lesson of submis- 
sion to God. And this accords with Romans 
viii. 20, 21, which may be explained thus: 
"For the creature" — the rational creation, man 
— "was made subject to vanity" — subjected to 
the frailty and imperfection and confinement 
of the physical body — "not willingly" — not of 
choice, but contrary to all its native tendencies 
and sensibilities — "by reason of" — through 
the direct arrangement of the Creator — " who 
hath subjected the same in hope" — with the 



Argument With the Restored ion ists. 139 

benevolent design — " that [a better translation 
than 'because'] the creature" — the human 
race, would by this arrangement — "be deliv- 
ered from the bondage of corruption " — this 
physical confinement and restriction — "into 
the glorious liberty of the children of God." * 

And so these physical conditions and sur- 
roundings of the human soul are designed to 
work only in the direction of salvation. No- 
tice, 

III. The conditions of infancy. 

Much confusion has arisen at this point from 
not properly discriminating between human 
nature and human character. Correctly speak- 
ing, human nature is what God makes men to 
be; human character is what men make them- 
selves to be by their own conduct. 

Human nature God makes in his own image. 
(James iii. 9.) Human character men make 
after another pattern; as our Saviour said, " Ye 
are of your father, the devil." (John viii. 44.) 

* See a masterly exegesis of this passage, in accordance 
with the foregoing view, in the Quarterly Christian Specta- 
tor, Vol X., p. 105. 



140 The Endless Future, 

Manifestly for what we are at birth God alone 
is responsible; for he is the author o£ the laws 
of propagation and of all their natural and 
unavoidable results. The infant nature, there- 
fore, is his ivork; and some writers appear not 
to have been as careful as they should have 
been in characterizing it. Among the condi- 
tions of infancy, notice: 

1. That the infant mind is started at zero — at 
nothing — and progresses by a gradual devel- 
opment. The result is that he cannot have his 
own way. He has numberless bodily wants 
that he cannot express, and which must re- 
main unsatisfied. Moreover, through all the 
forming period of childhood he must submit 
to the control of others. He must be restrained 
in a thousand ways and ten thousand times 
before he reaches the period of accountability, 
in order to keep him from self-destruction. 
Indeed, the entire period of infancy and child- 
hood is one continued experience of crossing, 
trial, and subjugation, kept up almost without 
intermission during his waking hours. Now, 
why all this training previous to accountabil- 



.•• 



Argument With the Bestorationists. 141 

ity ? The answer is that all this process of re- 
straint and curbing is precisely analogous to 
the restraint of God's law, when, farther on in 
life and at the age of accountability, that law 
meets him, and is doubtless designed to pre- 
pare the way for his submission to its com- 
mands. 

2. From the gradual unfolding of the infan- 
tile powers, he becomes a sinner with the least 
possible degree of deliberation; therefore with 
the least possible violation of conscience, and 
with the least possible blunting of the sensibil- 
ities; and therefore with fewer obstacles to be 
overcome in the work of recovery. 

3. Also, man never remembers the time when 
he became a sinner — when he first arrayed 
himself against the Almighty. The fallen 
angel has that dreadful time ever in remem- 
brance, and its appalling wickedness is doubt- 
less one element in his hopeless despair. 
Adam also had such a time to remember, and 
it might have driven him to a like despair had 
not his temptation softened within him the 
consciousness of guilt. But all men are now 



142 The Endless Future. 

spared this; for the time when sin was first 
entered on is lost amid the confusion of early 
and feeble impressions; and thus one great 
obstacle to repentance is prevented. 

4 Moreover, his first sinful acts are in dis- 
obedience to parental authority only, and not 
God's; and this softens in the mind the con- 
viction of criminality, and makes penitence 
more hopeful. 

On the whole, therefore, men in this world 
become sinners in the most favorable circum- 
stances for recovery; and so the entire condi- 
tions of infancy work only in the direction of 
salvation. 

IV. Death in infancy. 

How about those who die in infancy? Will 
the occasion of sin in them develop itself else- 
where? If not actually sinful at death, how 
can they be saved through the atonement? 
And if not saved through Christ, how can they 
learn the "new song?" 

The probability is that the dying infant is 
committed at once to the care and guardian- 
ship of the angels — "their angels" (Matt. xviii. 



Argument With the Besforationists. 143 

10) — and by them instructed in all that they 
themselves have learned of the wonders and 
glories of redemption, and is brought under 
the influence of all those motives which have 
been necessary to confirm themselves in obe- 
dience to God, and that in this way it be- 
comes established in holy living like any other 
newly-created being in the future ages of the 
universe. 

The work of redemption, in such a case, 
would avail to keep the infant from sinning, 
instead of, as in this world, delivering the soul 
from the power of actual sin; but in each case 
the glory of his final salvation will be due to 
the great Saviour, and the praises of redeem- 
ing love be chanted alike by all. 



144 The Endless Future. 



Chapter IV, 



ARGUMENT WITH THE RESTORATIONISTS 
(CONTINUED.) 

AS all of God's arrangements are wholly 
in the interest of holiness and the de- 
liverance of mankind from sin, so must be 
I. The relation of parent to child. 

1. We need not trace human sinfulness pri- 
marily to the parental relation, as is commonly 
done; for the devil and Adam both sinned 
without any such connection; and because the 
occasion of sin, as we have seen, is found in the 
necessary nature of free agency. 

2. Nor have we reason for believing that the 
occasion of sin has been aggravated by the pa- 
rental connection. It has evidently been mod- 
ified by it, so that the sin of the child is apt to 
take the same form as that of the parent; but 
it would have taken some form without this pa- 
rental connection — perhaps a worse one, as it 



Argument With the Restorationists. 145 

has in the devil. So that there is no evidence, 
either from reason or the Scriptures, that God 
has instituted the parental relation to help on 
sin, or thrown, by means of it, any obstacles in 
the way of holiness. 

3. We notice that the parental connection is 
apparently designed at every point to repress 
sin. For example, the parent is compelled, at 
the very outset, to curb the infantile self-ivill 
in order to derive any pleasure from his com- 
panionship. He must either subdue him or 
be subdued by him. The infant cannot con- 
trol himself, for he has no reason or judgment; 
and therefore the parent must do it. God has 
compelled him to do it by the very conditions 
of the infant mind. But notice, in so doing 
the parent represses the occasion of sin, and 
weakens its power over the child, and works 
thus, at the very outset, against this most ter- 
rific obstacle in the way of his salvation. 

4. The entire machinery of domestic life — its 

tenderness and love — is designed to educate 

the child to affection. The mutual dependence 

and helpfulness of the family arrangement 
10 



146 The Endless Future. 

tend, in the most striking manner, to educate 
him both to see and feel the nature, the duty, 
and the happiness of loving, and thus to un- 
derstand the nature and reasonableness of that 
first and great commandment, " Thou shalt love 
the Lord thy God." 

5. But the beauty and excellence of the pa- 
rental relation come out preeminently in this, 
that it gives the parent the opportunity of 
teaching the child submission to parental au- 
thority, which, above all other human instru- 
mentalities, prepares the way for his submis- 
sion to God; so that on the whole no reason 
appears why any individual of the human race 
does not, on account of the parental relation, 
come to the point of moral and responsible 
conduct with the conditions of his probation 
greatly improved over those of Adam or the 
fallen angels, and in more favorable circum- 
stances than either for securing his final sal- 
vation. 

II. Other conditions of humanity generally. 

1. The race has been created on the princi- 
ple of a progressive development, instead of be- 



Argument With the Restorationists. 147 

ing created all at one time; the result being 
that men can profit by the experience of the 
past — the record of history — and thus learn 
the nature and consequences of sin independ- 
ently of personal experience. 

2. The curse of unfruitfulness on the earth, 
compelling man to eat bread in the sweat of 
his face, and dooming him to a life-time of 
toil; yet operating, by the very necessity for 
laborious occupation, to subdue his imperious 
will and protect him from temptation. 

3. The entire array and admixture of provi- 
dential dealings, both in the way of judgment 
and mercy, meeting him at every step in life, 
correcting his waywardness, warning him 
against transgression, and pointing him ever 
toward the path of righteousness as being the 
only safe and proper one, making him see that 
wisdom's ways are " ways of pleasantness, and 
all her paths are peace." (Prov. iii. 17.) 

4. Temporal death, inherited from Adam, 
and yet also coming on men as the fearful and 
abiding testimony of God against their own 
sin; "death passed upon all men, for that 



148 The Endless Future. 

[Doddridge, 'unto which'] all have sinned;" 
standing as a grim specter in the path of every 
living man, grasping him at last with relent- 
less hand, and removing him by a visible proc- 
ess to that other, future world, pregnant to 
his guilty conscience with a righteous retribu- 
tion; and all to make him fear sin, and dread 
to commit it as being "the sting of death." 

5. And this, contrasted with the bright world 
in which he lives, and in which God " hath 
made every thing beautiful in his time," and 
whose beauty sinfulness only has marred; 
filled with every variety of Divine manifesta- 
tion, and illustrating, in every conceivable as- 
pect, the wisdom, power, and benevolence of 
God. 

6. Moral government everywhere — in the 
family, the State, and the nation — designed 
to instruct the race in the prime duty of sub- 
mission to law and authority, that they might 
thus learn submission to God. 

7. The Bible, God's direct revelation to men, 
unfolding to them his character for " goodness 
and severity," as one who "forgiveth iniquity, 



Argument With the Restorationists. 149 

transgression, and sin, and that will by no 
means clear the guilty" (Ex. xxxiv. 7), reveal- 
ing his righteous law— to "love God with all 
their hearts and their neighbor as them- 
selves " — filled with all encouragement to right 
living and acting, and all warnings and threat- 
enings against an evil course, and with all 
needed instructions for the guidance of men. 

8. All instrumentalities for creating and 
deepening religious feeling and conviction — 
prayers and praises, sacraments and Sabbaths, 
Christian intercourse and the preaching of the 
word, by which its warnings and exhortations, 
its promises and threatenings, and its whole 
mighty array of gospel truth, are kept ever 
sounding in human ears. 

Viewed in this light, the world may be re- 
garded as one mighty mass of means and 
efforts for reforming and saving men; as a 
vast ivork-room, filled with every description of 
the most powerful and complicated machinery 
for this object; and God himself presiding 
over all, directing all, the omnipotent energy 
that keeps all in motion, and thus throwing 



150 The Endless Future, 

himself, as it were, with all the resources of 
his infinite nature, on the side of repentance 
and salvation. 

The appeals, however, which he makes to 
fear and affection are his mightiest efforts in 
this direction, and these demand distinct and 
separate consideration. 



Argument With the Bestorationists. 151 



Chapter V, 



argument with the bestorationists 
(continued). 

SINFUL character is not changed by the use 
of stronger motives. 

The threefold instrumentality which God 
is using with the most effective power for hu- 
man salvation is the appeal to fear and affec- 
tion, accompanied by the influences of the Holy 
Spirit. Nothing in the future world can ex- 
ceed this in effectiveness, for it is the most 
effective which the universe can furnish. 

1. Take the appeal to affection. Is there any 
better kind of effort or instrumentality than 
this? any thing more powerful or efficient, 
better adapted to lead a man to give up sin 
and choose holiness? If so, what? We know 
of none. The Restorationist knows of none. 
And this is the exact appeal which God is 
now making in the whole grand scheme of re- 
demption; and he is seeking in this way to give 



152 The Endless Future. 

expression to his own infinite qffectioyi for this 
sinful world, in order to win its love in return. 

Notice what he says in John iii. .16: "God 
so loved the world, that he gave his only-begot- 
ten Son, that whosoever belie veth in him 
should not perish, but have everlasting life." 
Also, 1 John iv. 10: "Herein is love, not that 
we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent 
his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." 

Notice again that the Saviour himself is de- 
clared to have come on this errand of mercy to 
the sinful from affection — "Christ also hath loved 
us, and hath given himself for us." (Eph. v. 2.) 
And the apostle, in Ephesians iii. 19, speaks 
of "the love of Christ which passeth knowledge''' 

Notice again that the Infinite Spirit of God 
is ever working with tenderness and love in 
human souls. He is sent to convince men of 
sin. He comes to the penitent soul as "the 
Comforter." He takes of the things of Christ 
and shows them to men; and wherever Chris- 
tian love exists in a human soul, it is because 
" the love of God is shed abroad " in it "by the 
Holy Ghost." (Rom. v. 5.) 



Argument With the Bestorationists. 153 

Notice again that God has drawn all heaven 
into sympathy with him, and the holy angels 
also have come to love the salvation of men. 
Therefore the Saviour says, in Luke xv. 10: 
" There is joy in the presence of the angels of 
God over one sinner that repenteth." Also, we 
learn from Hebrews i. 14 that they find their 
delightful employment in ministering to those 
who have been forgiven: "Are they not all 
ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for 
them who shall be heirs of salvation?" 

And thus we learn that affection for this 
world of sinners pervades all heaven. The 
Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, and the an- 
gels, are pouring out one mighty stream of 
affection on this guilty world in order to melt 
it in contrition and love. 

Now, the point is that there is no other kind 
of influence or instrumentality for drawing 
men to God superior to this. Even the whole 
universe cannot furnish an influence equal to 
it. It is absolutely the mightiest power in ex- 
istence to move a moral being to right action. 
Does the Eestorationist deny this? Then let 



154 The Endless Future. 

him mention one more powerful. He cannot. 
And therefore the conclusion is inevitable, and 
he should so receive it, that the Divine re- 
sources in respect to the kind of influence that 
will draw men in loving obedience to God are 
utterly exhausted. When God has shown his 
own loving heart to men in the gift of his Son, 
and Jesus has shown his own infinite affection 
by dying for them, and the Holy Spirit has 
done his tender, loving work upon their hearts 
in his gracious strivings, and all heaven is 
represented as sympathizing with them, no 
other influence can transcend this as a moving 
power upon men for their reformation and 
salvation. 

Now, secondly, how about the degree of this 
affection? It has been shown that there is no 
better kind of influence than this ; but possibly it 
is lacking in degree. There may have been here 
in this world a half-heartedness about it, and 
some improvement in this respect may be pos- 
sible hereafter; so that if this affection should 
only be modified in degree, the reformation of the 
sinner in the future world would certainly follow 



Argument With the Restorationists. 155 

it. How is this ? Here notice that in providing 
this scheme of redemption for fallen man the 
affection of the Almighty has had its mightiest 
possible exercise and expression. He gave his 
own Son to sufferings and death, even the ag- 
ony of the crucifixion. Yea, more, his "well- 
beloved Son " — the very dearest object of affec- 
tion which he had to give. Yea, more, his only 
Son — no other one to give. And therefore no 
greater proof or expression of affection is pos- 
sible — nothing beyond it. It was the expres- 
sion of infinite affection, in the very nature of 
the case impossible to be increased in intensity. 
The point is that God has loved this sinful 
world with the whole strength of his infinite 
nature, even all he could love it. He has ex- 
hausted himself— his own infinite self — in his 
love for men, and there is no possible depth or 
strength of affection beyond it. 

And why should he not love thus? In the 
view we are taking, the holiness and happiness 
of the endless universe of moral beings were 
turning on the sacrifice of Christ. His own 
glory and exaltation among them for evermore 



156 The Endless Future. 

— the love, homage, adoration, and praise of 
the endless universe of beings for himself for- 
ever — were all turning on it. In every aspect 
in which it can be viewed, infinite interests 
were turning on the great sacrifice of Christ 
for human sinfulness; and how, then, could 
any love but that of infinite, unbounded affec- 
tion, as well as infinite sacrifice, correspond 
with the interests at stake? 

How, in the next place, about the manifes- 
tation of this affection? Perhaps there has 
been something lacking at this point, so that 
the expressiveness of manifestation can be here- 
after in some way increased, and so wicked 
men be led by it to give up sin in the future 
world. How is this? 

Here notice the pains God was at in the work 
of preparation to make this manifestation the 
most influential possible. All the prophecies 
of the Old Testament for hundreds of years 
were made to point forward to Christ as the 
great central figure of the future. Almost the 
entire Mosaic ritual was designed to prefig- 
ure him, and to explain to men the nature and 



Argument Vi ith the Bestorationists. 157 

object of his mission. The New Testament 
is almost entirely taken up with the unfolding 
of his character and the record of his ministry. 
What is there lacking at this point? 

Could his mission to the world be any more 
clearly stated than it is? Says Christ himself 
(Luke xix. 10): "The Son of man is come to 
seek and to save that ivhich was lost" And the 
apostle speaks of it in 1 Timothy i. 15 thus: 
"This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all 
acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the 
world to save sinners." Can it be any more 
clearly stated? 

Could his character be portrayed in more 
attractive and winning traits than it is? He 
is "meek and lowly in heart," the Friend of 
sinners, comforting the mourners, weeping 
with the sorrowful, and even in his last agony 
praying for his murderers. The prophet Isa- 

0- 

iah, in that wonderful fifty-third chapter, look- 
ing forward in vision, thus describes him as 
he would be: "A man of sorrows, and ac- 
quainted with grief; wounded for our trans- 
gressions, and bruised for our iniquities;" 



158 The Endless Future. 

oppressed and afflicted, yet opening not his 
mouth; "brought as a lamb to the slaughter, 
and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so 
he openeth not his mouth." And see, too, his 
infinite tenderness in Isaiah xlii. 3, quoted 
also in Matthew xii. 20: "A bruised reed shall 
he not break, and smoking flax shall he not 
quench." Can a more lovely and attractive 
character be portrayed? 

Could any mightier icorks attest his divine 
mission than those which he wrought — raising 
the dead, cleansing the lepers, stilling the 
tempest with a word, and feeding the thou- 
sands in the wilderness with a few loaves and 
fishes ? We can think of none. 

Could his teachings and instructions be im- 
proved? Was any truth left unsaid which 
would have a tendency to save men? Were 
any necessary directions omitted? Were any 
disclosures of the past, the present, or the fut- 
ure withheld which would have been better 
calculated to move men to repentance and 
reformation? Was there any lack of faithful- 
ness in warning, tenderness in pleading, or 



■Argument With the Restorationists. 159 

earnestness in persuasion? Was there any 
lack of kindness and love and compassion in 
any or all the manifestations of his character, 
his teachings, or his works? But one answer 
can be given to these questions by any one 
familiar with the New Testament. No one is 
able to suggest the least addition or change of 
any kind which would increase the effective- 
ness of his mission. It was dictated by tender 
love, by infinite affection for lost sinners; and 
why should not that affection have had the 
fullest expression, and have always worked out 
itself to the utmost ? Why should any change 
be possible, and at the same time advanta- 
geous? He came "to seek and to save; " came 
on purpose for this ; and why should any thing 
have been omitted calculated to make his mis- 
sion more successful? The supposition that 
he left any thing unattempted in so important 
a work would convict the great Redeemer of 
carelessness or incompetence, and this would 
be akin to blasphemy. No; the Lord Jesus, 
when on earth, did the best that could be done 
to rescue men from perdition, and has been 



160 The Endless Future. 



doing it ever since; and nothing can be added 
to those efforts in the future world which 
would increase the likelihood of success. 

2. Take the appeal to fear. Can this be in- 
creased in terribleness, or made apparently in 
any way more influential than it is to deter 
from sin? Can Divine judgments upon dar- 
ing transgressors be any more swift and terri- 
ble — the sinning angels cast down to hell; the 
wicked world drowned by the deluge; the rain 
of fire and brimstone upon the cities of the 
plain; the earth opening her mouth and clos- 
ing it upon Dathan and Abiram for their im- 
piety; the wholesale destruction of seven na- 
tions in the land of Canaan by the sword and 
by the hailstones from heaven for their wick- 
edness? Can any thing go beyond this in 
promptness and terribleness of execution? 

Can God's personal attitude toward sinners 
be portrayed with greater terribleness than it 
is in Psalm xi. 6 — " Upon the wicked he shall 
rain snares, fire, and brimstone, and a horrible 
tempest; this shall be the portion of their 
cup? " Or this, 2 Thessalonians i. 7, 8: " The 



Argument With the Bestorationists. 161 

Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven 
with his mighty angels, in flaming fire tak- 
ing vengeance on them that know not God, 
and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus 
Christ? " Also, that solemn warning of Jesus 
himself in Luke xii. 5, already quoted: "Fear 
him, which after he hath killed hath power to 
cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, Fear him? " 

Can any more fearful imagery be conceived 
than that which God uses to depict the final 
consequences of sin — the undying worm, the 
lake of fire, the " gnawing of their tongues for 
pain," the cry for but a single drop of water 
to cool the parched tongue, and even this de- 
nied? Is not this an aggregate of pictured 
horror to deter from sin that cannot be sur- 
passed? Let the Restorationist himself en- 
deavor to increase its terribleness by adding 
something to it, and he will find at once how 
vain the effort. 

3. Now, once more, can any mightier agency 
be employed to give efficacy in the human soul 
to all this moral machinery than the Holy 
Spirit? 
11 



162 The Endless Future. 

His office-work, as the Saviour says, is to 
deal with the conscience of the world upon 
this very matter of salvation. He says, in 
John xvi. 8, " When he [the Spirit of truth] 
is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and 
of righteousness, and of judgment;" of sin, 
as that by which they have forfeited the favor 
of God; of righteousness , as that which opens 
for them the great plan of salvation from it; 
of judgment, as the final and dreadful penalty 
for rejecting this salvation. And the Spirit, 
it is believed, is dealing with the conscience of 
the entire world upon these tremendous mat- 
ters, as is evident from the peculiar phraseol- 
ogy of the passage, " He shall reprove [or con- 
vince] the world of sin." 

Now the point is, can any mightier agency be 
employed in this work of conviction in the 
human soul, and so make these appeals to fear 
and affection any more efficacious in the direc- 
tion of saving men? The question needs only 
to be asked, for he is the omnipotent Spirit of 
God. It is God himself, the third person in 
the Trinity, working directly in the souls of 



Argument With the Bestorationists. 163 

men for their conversion and reformation, their 
restoration to the forfeited favor and friend- 
ship of the Almighty; and there is no power 
beyond it. 

Now comes up the great question we are dis- 
cussing: Can any thing more be done any- 
where in God's universe, or at any future time, 
over and above what God has already done 
and is doing, to reform human character? 
And the answer unhesitatingly is, No; for God 
himself has so declared it. Planting himself, 
as it were, on these entire workings of his prov- 
idence and grace and Spirit, he declares, in 
Isaiah v. 4, " What could have been done more 
to my vineyard that I have not done in it?" 
plainly teaching in this that he had done the 
best that could be done to save men, and thus 
as plainly asserting that the very resources of 
Omnipotence had been exhausted in this ivorld 
in the work of human salvation. 

Let the Restorationist, therefore, be assured 
that his scheme is without foundation; that 
the whole universe of God can furnish no 
mightier agencies to save him than those 



164 The Endless Future. 

which God tries upon him here in this world, 
and that if he dares to resist these, and go into 
the future world without repentance for sin 
and faith in Jesus Christ, he chooses a posi- 
tion where nothing better can ever reach him, 
and hands over himself, from the very neces- 
sities of the case, to final and eternal impeni- 
tence. 



Condition of the Heathen, 165 



Chapter VI, 

objection: condition of the heathen. 

AT this point comes up the objection that 
the heathen, as well as the ignorant and 
vicious of our city populations, do not enjoy 
these privileges, and therefore do not have in 
this world a fair probation, and are not proper 
subjects for punishment hereafter; and there- 
fore that a future probation is necessary for 
them, in order to vindicate the benevolence of 
God. Answer : 

1. They are truly sinful. They do not act 
up to the light and knowledge they have. For 
example : 

They know God; for said Paul in his preach- 
ing to such (Acts xiv. 17): "He left not him- 
self without witness, in that he did good, and 
gave us rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, 
filling our hearts with food and gladness." 

Also, they have a conscience; for the apostle 



166 The Endless Future, 

says, in Romans ii. 15, respecting such: " Which 
show the work of the law written in their 
hearts, their conscience also bearing witness." 

And against this light and reason they sin. 
"They did not like to retain God in their 
knowledge." (Bom. i. 28.) And "when they 
knew God, they glorified him not as God, 
neither were thankful." (Rom. i. 21.) 

2. They are inexcusable in their sinfulness; 
for says the apostle (Rom. i. 20): "For the in- 
visible things of God since the creation of the 
world are clearly seen, being perceived through 
the things that are made, even his everlasting 
power and divinity, that they may be without 
excuse" (Revised Version.) 

Moreover, every man knows that he should 
"love his neighbor as himself," and, wherever 
he takes a selfish advantage of him, knows 
that he is not doing as he would be done by; 
and no depth of moral degradation can ever 
obliterate from his mind the conviction of his 
meanness and wickedness. 

3. The heathen fully recognize their oivn 
guilt, and are seeking by sacrifice, prayers, 



Condition of the Heathen. 167 

fasting, pilgrimages, and penance to propitiate 
an offended Deity. And if, with these ex- 
ternal professions of penitence, there is any — 
the least real — penitence, no reason appears 
why it is not accepted, and made the ground 
of final salvation. "In every nation he that 
feareth God and worketh righteousness is ac- 
cepted with him." (Acts x. 35.) And true 
penitence is "working righteousness;" and it 
would seem that such a one would gladly ac- 
cept of Christ as soon 'as he is made known to 
him in the future world. And any one who 
would accept of Christ, were he but revealed 
to him, will undoubtedly be saved. 

But if he only makes ajjretense of sorrow for 
sin — at the bottom a sham and an attempt to 
impose on the god he worships — or if he ex- 
presses gratitude, and still has no thankfulness 
at heart, no reason appears why he does not 
merit a condemnation proportioned to his in- 
gratitude and hypocrisy. Therefore, 

4. The heathen do have a fair probation. 
Every one of them in many things sees clearly 
what is right; and whenever he sees it, is eter- 



168 The Endless Future. 

nally bound by it in the face of all opposing 
influences. When he has seen the right, there 
is and there can be no excuse for not following 
it. Not to follow it is sin — high-handed and 
inexcusable sin — and deserving of punish- 
ment. 

And it is for this he is to be punished; and 
his punishment is not to go one iota beyond 
his real and inexcusable guilt. True it is that, 
to a certain extent, he is ignorant; and the fact 
will be fully taken into account, and will go 
far toward mitigating the severity of his pun- 
ishment; for said the Saviour, "He that knew 
not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, 
shall be beaten with few stripes." (Luke xii. 
48.) 

"But," says the objector, "he has not the 
light of the gospel." True, and .this fact also 
will make his sin and punishment correspond- 
ingly light. 

"But why, then," he asks, "does he not have 
the gospel? Why, if it be so priceless a 
blessing, has it not been given to the world 
long ere this? Why have eighteen centuries 



Condition of the Heathen. 169 

rolled away since Christ died upon the cross, 
and yet the mass of mankind never heard of 
him ? God could have strewn the world with 
Bibles, in every language, if he so pleased. 
Why has he not done it? Why is by far the 
greater part of the world to-day cursed with 
heathenish blindness and ignorance ? " 

We are too ignorant and short-sighted our- 
selves to answer these questions fully; but 
some things are to be considered: 

1. The one urging this assumes that if only 
this were done the heathen would be saved. 
But this assumption is groundless. How few 
comparatively accept the gospel, and are saved 
by it, even in Christian lands! Only one in Jive 
pretends to be godly even in this land — the 
most highly favored with the gospel and its 
institutions. 

2. To those in Christian lands who neglect 
or reject it, as the masses do, it becomes only 
an additional burden of condemnation; as the 
apostle called it, "a savor of death unto death." 
(2 Cor. ii. 16.) 

3. Should the gospel, therefore, be given to 



170 The Endless Future. 

the world in any other way than the one God 
has chosen — namely, through the efforts and 
self-denials and sacrifices of his Church — the 
result might only be disastrous, very likely re- 
sulting only in a cold and contemptuous rejec- 
tion of it, and a correspondingly deeper guilt 
and ruin. 

4. The use the heathen make of the light 
and knowledge they have shows the use they 
might make of greater privileges. If they 
abuse the light they have, they might abuse 
greater. "He that is unjust in the least is 
unjust also in much." (Luke xvi. 10.) And 
how fast, and how far, and in what way, wicked 
men, anywhere in the world, can be success- 
fully approached with gospel privileges so as 
to secure the certainty of their salvation is a 
problem God only can solve ; and we are obliged 
to leave the solution of it with him, only 
being careful to do our own personal duty 
in the premises, and preach his gospel with 
all our might and as widely as we have oppor- 
tunity. 

5. We have every reason for believing that 



Condition of the Heathen. 171 

God is blessing all efforts made to give the 
gospel to the world to the full extent that he 
wisely and properly can, and stimulating his 
Church to the utmost to spread the true knowl- 
edge of himself among men; and that should 
he deviate in the least from the plan he has 
chosen, he would endanger the welfare of his 
entire administration. 



172 The Endless Future. 



Chapter VII. 



ANNIHILATION IMPOSSIBLE — ENDLESS FREEDOM 
IN SINNING IMPOSSIBLE — THE ENDLESS CON- 
FINEMENT OF THE SINNER INEVITABLE. 

ANNIHILATION of the wicked impossi- 
ble. 

If sinners cannot be reformed in the future 
world, and the scheme of the Restoration ist 
is a failure, may they not at least be anni- 
hilated ? 

This, too, is impossible; for in that case, ac- 
cording to the view we are taking, the very 
next race of moral beings created after their 
annihilation, having now no tangible and con- 
vincing evidence of God's hatred of sin, or of 
its terrible nature, or of the danger of com- 
mitting it — in short, no appeal to fear — would 
certainly do as their predecessors had done, 
and rebel. Why should they not? If the cir- 
cumstances become the same, why should not 



Annihilation Impossible. 173 

the result be the same? Then they, too, must 
be annihilated; and so the next, and also the 
next, and so there be nothing left but for the 
universe to revolve in an endless cycle of sin 
and annihilation; and such a universe would 
be an absurdity. 

Endless freedom in sinning impossible. 

If the wicked can neither be reformed nor 
annihilated, can they not be allowed to range 
the universe at will and work out their wick- 
edness unchecked, anywhere and everywhere 
forever? 

1. This would ruin the authority of God as a 
moral Governor. For in that case he would 
neither threaten nor execute any penalty for 
sin. He would therefore show no preference 
for holiness over sin, treating both alike, and 
showing in this no regard for the moral char- 
acter of his subjects; and this would ruin his 
reputation for holiness. He would also show 
no regard for the welfare of the endless uni- 
verse, which is all resting on obediente to him- 
self; and this would ruin his reputation for 
benevolence; and when his reputation for holi- 



174 The Endless Future. 

ness and benevolence were both gone, who 
would care for his authority? 

2. It would make a universal hell. Only let 
the wicked go unpunished, and all other moral 
beings, as we have seen, would follow their 
example, and rebel against the authority of 
God; and universal rebellion, as was shown in 
another connection, would make a universal 
hell, to which the hell of the Bible would be 
comparatively an insignificant matter. And let 
it be repeated that the punishment and suffer- 
ing of all the sinners in God's universe who 
will finally be punished would only be to the 
misery of unrestrained rebellion like a drop 
to the ocean in comparison. 

The endless confinement of the sinner the only 
alternative. 

There is, therefore, no other alternative but 
the confinement of incorrigible sinners forever 
in the great prison-house of the universe. 
Because sin must be arrested, as has been said, 
at all hazards, and every conceivable sacrifice 
necessary; and any thing that will but ac- 
complish this must, inMhe very nature of the 



Annihilation of the Wicked Impossible. 175 

case, be not only indispensable, but benevo- 
lent. 

Endless punishment is, therefore, only a 
benevolent arrangement, reducing, as it does, 
to the minimum the necessary sufferings of a 
universe which sin has invaded. 



176 The Endless Future. 



Chapter VIII. 



MORAL THEORY OF THE ATONEMENT. 

THIS is partly true, but fundamentally- 
false. 

That one of the leading designs of the atone- 
ment is to draw meru-in loving obedience to 
God is true. 

Furthermore, that it is the most poiverful 
influence in that direction which the universe 
furnishes is also true; and the moral theory 
asserts these. 

But its fundamental position is that "the 
primary design of the atonement is to succor 
and save men" This is erroneous and mis- 
chievous; for, 

1. The Bible makes no such assertion. 

2. If human salvation be the primary design 
of the atonement, then, as the atonement is the 
great central fact of the universe, and every 



Moral Theory of the Atonement 177 

thing else subordinate and subservient to it, so 
must every thing else be subordinate and sub- 
servient to its main design. And if the main 
design of it be human salvation, then every 
thing else must give way to that, and mankind 
be saved to a pertainty, and universalism is 
the logical result. 

The only position that fully harmonizes with 
the Bible is that the main design — the prime 
object — of the atonement is not to save men, 
but the universe of moral beings, as far as 
possible. 

To make the salvation of men merely the 
prime object would appear utterly inharmo- 
nious with the magnitude of the expenditure. 
The atonement is an infinite provision — a work 
in which omnipotence travels in the great- 
ness of its strength, and whose results are to 
"satisfy" the Eedeemer for all his mighty 
sufferings. (Isa. liii. 11.) And no results 
reached here* in this world, where sin and not 
holiness, rebellion and not salvation, have been 
almost the universal rule for six thousand 
years, can possibly be made to harmonize with 



178 The Endless Future. 

so mighty a work. Indeed, nothing finite — no 
achievement that is limited in its results — can 
harmonize with it. And no conceivable view 
but that which makes the whole endless uni- 
verse of moral beings, endlessly enlarging, to 
be dependent on the sacrifice of Christ for final 
confirmation in holiness and happiness will 
fully correspond with the infinite greatness 
and grandeur of the expenditure. 

So we say that the prime object of the atone- 
ment must be the salvation of moral -beings 
anywhere and everywhere where salvation is 
possible. Wherever in the wide universe 
Christ can accomplish salvation so as to com- 
pensate him for his infinite sacrifice, or at 
whatever time — now, hereafter, or forever — he 
will do it. And this sweeping statement is 
borne out by the Scriptures. "Noiv" says the 
apostle, in Ephesians iii. 10, "noiv" — in these 
incipient stages of the moral universe — God 
is revealing himself in the atonement, and 
through the redeemed "church," to the angels 
of heaven. The " principalities and powers in 
heavenly places" have been all comprehended 



Moral Theory of the Atonement. 179 

in its provisions. Why and wherefore, if it be 
not to draw them in loving obedience to him- 
self? 

Notice again, in Ephesians ii. 7, that "in the 
ages to come " — the long ages of eternity — the 
same manifestation will be made, and God will 
continue to "show the exceeding riches of his 
grace, through Christ Jesus," it does not say 
to whom, but why should we not reverently as- 
sume to all moral beings who shall come after 
them through the endless ages, and with the 
same grand object in view — the endless con- 
firmation of them also in holiness and happi- 
ness? Such, at least, is the theory of the 
atonement sketched in these pages; and it is 
believed to be the only one perfectly harmoniz- 
ing with all the facts and intimations of the 
Bible. This makes salvation its prime object 
everywhere and forever: in this world, to save 
all who can be led to repentance for their sin ; 
in the "ages to come," to save all from sin- 
ning. 

And this is entirely reasonable; for the sal- 
vation of moral beings elsewhere is just as im- 



180 The Endless Future. 

portant and valuable as their salvation here in 
this world. 

Also, it is just as important and desirable to 
keep moral beings from sinning as to save 
them after they have sinned. And even more 
so; for sinless beings have done nothing to 
forfeit God's favor, while the sinful have 
wickedly rebelled against him, and can claim 
nothing from him now but justice; and that 
would doom them to perdition. 

The general position, therefore, now taken 
is this: That God intends so to deal with the 
sinful of this world, both in the way of judg- 
ment as well as mercy, as to save the endless 
universe of moral beings, hereafter to be cre- 
ated, from following their wicked example; 
and this is the only theory of the atonement 
that is at all defensible. 

Any theory or belief that proposes to set 
aside judgment, either wholly or in part, as the 
prevailing belief does, is, as has been said, false 
from the foundation, and utterly at variance 
with the entire spirit and letter of the Bible. 
Moreover, in preaching, the two great matters 



Moral Theory of the Atonement. 181 

of judgment and mercy can never be separated 
without doing an irreparable injury to the 
cause of truth and endangering the salvation 
of sinful men. If men could as well be saved 
without presenting the terrors of perdition; if 
they could be drawn to repentance by the pres- 
entation of Christ's tenderness and love mere- 
ly, then Christ himself would have adopted 
that method of preaching, for his pitiful nat- 
ure certainly shrunk as much from unneces- 
sarily wounding human sensibilities as any 
one of ours does. But he evidently deemed 
the opposite method essential, and everywhere 
in his preaching makes the appeal to fear fully 
as prominent as the appeal to affection; and 
his ministering servant can do no better than 
to copy his example. 

When, therefore, he who advocates the 
moral theory of the atonement insists on pre- 
senting the love of God in Christ as the great 
motive to obedience, but insists also in leaving 
out of his preaching the terrors of God's 
wrath, let him understand that he does not 
knotv enough respecting the necessities and ex- 



182 The Endless Future. 

igencies of the endless universe thus to tam- 
per in his pulpit ministrations with the word 
of God, and keep back a part, and soften 
down its threatenings, and assume practically 
that he knows better than the Almighty what 
kind of preaching to give men. What right 
has he to undertake to improve on the preach- 
ing of the Saviour? A due loyalty to his sol- 
emn commission demands that he "declare to 
men the ivhole counsel of God." (Acts xx. 27. ) 

If, therefore, he is to preach with clearness 
and impressiveness the great truth that " he 
that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life," 
so is he to preach with equal clearness and 
earnestness that "he that believeth not the 
Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God 
abideth on him." (John iii. 36.) 

As a test question, let every preacher of the 
word ask himself this: Would the views I en- 
tertain of the atonement and of the future of 
the wicked lead me to say, with Paul, "I 
ceased not to warn every one night and day 
with tears?" (Acts xx. 31.) And if he fails 
at this vital point, let him remember the fear- 



Moral Theory of the Atonement. 183 

f ul warning God gives him by the prophet Eze- 
kiel (xxxiii. 8): "When I say unto the wicked, 
O wicked man, thou shalt surely die; if thou 
dost not speak to warn the wicked from his 
way, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity; 
but his blood will I require at thine hand." 



184 The Endless Future. 



Chapter IX, 



A PEOGKESSIVE SYSTEM. 

THE evidence that the present system is a 
progressive one is ample and undeniable. 
Hence, many, discerning this fact, conclude at 
once that perfection must be the final result; 
and therefore=that future and endless punish- 
ment for sin can form no part of the system. 
But this is contradicted by the view presented 
in the foregoing pages. The system herein 
developed is a progressive one throughout, 
and meets all the evidence of progression 
which exists. It commences with the creation 
of matter, then advances to the creation of a 
single race of moral beings, and then goes on 
with the creation of other and future races of 
moral beings forever. It is a system progress- 
ing eternally. It progresses from nothing to 
infinity. No system can be conceived of more 
thoroughly and entirely progressive than the 
one developed in this book. 



A Progressive System. 185 

But now, let it be noticed that sin and pun- 
ishment in it are both shown to be eternal. In- 
deed, the possibility of this progression is seen 
to rest upon the fact that sin will, in certain 
cases, receive its appropriate and endless pun- 
ishment as the only security against universal 
anarchy and the ultimate apostasy of the whole 
moral universe of God. 

A progressive system, therefore, does not 
necessarily result in the entire eradication 
from itself of sin and suffering; and, although 
the present system is clearly a progressive one, 
it may still, upon the ground of human reason, 
contain within itself the endless punish#fcnt 
of sin. 



186 The Endless Future. 



Chapter X, 

BENEVOLENCE OF THE MORAL SYSTEM. 

THE case, therefore, is reduced to this: 
Hell, or no moral system. 

Why, then, have a moral system at all? If 
it be distinctly foreseen that such a system 
will be endlessly burdened with suffering, 
why not dispense with it altogether ? Answer : 
Holiness and consequent happiness are as 
valuable in the way of good, as sin and conse- 
quent misery are bad in the way of evil; and 
the one as important to be secured as the other 
to be prevented. 

But, furthermore, the conditions of the fut- 
ure universe will be, to all appearance, these: 
On the one hand there will be endless suffering 
from the incursions of sin, yet not increasing 
in number or magnitude; on the other, endless 
holiness and happiness, increasing endlessly. 
And now, would it be benevolent in the Al- 



Benevolence of the Moral System. 187 

mighty to sacrifice the holiness and happiness 
of an endless universe, endlessly enlarging, to 
the wickedness of the comparatively few who 
choose rebellion, and who alone are responsi- 
ble for their sufferings? This would be con- 
trary to the commonest dictates of common 
sense. Common sense decides, in all human 
affairs, that a man should ever do that which 
is, on the whole, for the best. Why should not 
God? 

This the present theory represents him as 
doing — doing ever the next best . thing, and 
working ever in the direction of holiness and 
salvation. To secure the obedience and salva- 
tion of the fallen angels was impossible. They 
all rebelled, notwithstanding the best that 
could be done for them. 

In the case of mankind a 'part only can be 
led to repentance; and God saves every one 
whom he wisely can up to the very last unit. 
I say he saves all whom he wisely can. This 
is certain. Perhaps he saves all whom he 
safely can. Perhaps if he saved even one more 
than he does, he would just so far tempt the 



188 The Endless Future. 

moral universe to presume on his leniency, 
and dare rebellion. There may be a limit be- 
yond which it is not safe to show mercy to the 
rebellious. There may be an exact point be- 
yond which the exertion of those peculiar in- 
fluences of the Holy Spirit necessary to secure 
repentance would begin to sap the foundations 
of moral government, and endanger the wel- 
fare and happiness of the whole moral uni- 
verse; and beyond that point even infinite 
benevolence must not pass. 

The unf alien angels have all been kept true 
to God and duty, creating thus the strong 
probability, even the almost certainty, that a 
point will eventually be reached when all new- 
ly created beings can be confirmed in obedience 
to God without the personal experience of 
transgression, thus making the moral universe 
to be advancing ever in the direction of holi- 
ness and happiness, and in the only ivay possible. 

In this view, a period will eventually be 
reached when all the sin and misery of the 
universe will become an infinitesimal as com- 
pared with its holiness and happiness; so that 



Benevolence of the Moral System. 189 



with all this grievous drawback of endless sin 
and misery, the present moral system will ap- 
pear to be just infinitely better than none at 
all, and God's character be vindicated before 
all worlds as being that of infinite and perfect 
benevolence. 



190 The Endless Future. 



Chapter XI, 

CONCLUSION. 

ENDLESS punishment becomes the inevi- 
table lot of all who dare go into eternity 
unforgiven. Not because God desires their 
perdition, for he is " not willing that any should 
perish." Not because he does not rather in- 
finitely desire their salvation, for he has made 
an infinite sacrifice to render it possible, and 
now, as he says, "will have all men to be 
saved." Not because he has left any thing 
unattempted in the work of human recovery, 
or could do, properly and consistently, in this 
direction, any thing more than he has done, for 
his declaration is clear and explicit: "What 
could have been done more to my vineyard that 
I have not done in it?" 

The only reason why any one is lost is, he 
will not be saved. He will not give up his sin. 
He loves it and clings to it. He puts the fol- 



Conclusion. 191 



lies and vanities of the world in the place of 
the immortal crown. He resolutely pushes 
away the realities of death, judgment, and eter- 
nity from his view, even though he knows he 
is so soon to meet them. Especially he loves 
his own way, and is determined to have it, even 
though he dares by it the wrath of God. 



192 The Endless Future. 



- 

Chapter XII. 

QUOTATION FEOM RICHARD BAXTER. 

AND now to the poor, thoughtless ones who 
are going into eternity with no proper 
preparation wherewith to meet it conies the 
solemn address and warning of Richard Baxter : 

11 Men and Brethren: The Eternal God that 
made you for a life everlasting, and hath re- 
deemed you by his only Son, when you had 
lost it and yourselves, being mindful of you in 
your sin and misery, hath indited the gospel, 
and sealed it by his Spirit, and commanded his 
ministers to preach it to the world, that pardon 
being freely offered you, and heaven being set 
before you, he might call you off from your 
fleshly pleasures, and from following after this 
deceitful world, and acquaint you with the life 
you were created and redeemed for, before you 
are dead and past remedy. 

"The Lord seeth how you forget him and 



Quotation from Richard Baxter. 193 

your latter end, and how light you make of 
everlasting things, as men that understand not 
what they have to do or suffer. He seeth how 
bold you are in sin, and how fearless of his 
threatenings, and how careless of your souls. 
He seeth the dreadful day at hand, when your 
sorrows will begin, and you must lament all 
this with fruitless cries in torment and desper- 
ation, if true conversion now prevent it not. 
In compassion to your sinful, miserable souls, 
the Lord hath made it our duty to speak to 
you in his name, and to tell you plainly of your 
sin and misery, and what will be your end, and 
how sad a change you will shortly see, if yet 
you go on a little longer. 

"He sees and pities you while you are 
drowned in worldly cares and pleasures, eager- 
ly following childish toys, and wasting that 
short and precious time for a thing of naught 
in which you should make ready for an ever- 
lasting life; and therefore he hath commanded 
us to call after you, and tell you how you lose 
your labor and are about to lose your souls. 

"But alas! to the grief of our souls and your 

. 13 



194 The Endless Future. 

undoing, you stop your ears, you stiffen your 
necks, you harden your hearts, and send us 
back to God with groans to tell him that we 
have done his message, but can do no good on 
you, nor scarcely get a sober hearing. O that 
our eyes were a fountain of tears! O that the 
Lord would fill our hearts with more compas- 
sion for these sinful, miserable souls! Why, 
if the God that made them and the Christ 
that bought them might only be heard, the case 
would soon be altered with tHem. But if 
nothing can be heard, what shall we do for 
them? If the dreadful God of heaven be 
slighted, who then shall be regarded? If the 
inestimable love and blood of a Redeemer be 
made light of, what then shall be valued? If 
heaven has no desirable glory with them, and 
everlasting joys be nothing worth; if they can 
jest at hell, and dance about the bottomless pit, 
and play with the consuming fire, and that 
when God and man do warn them of it, what 
shall we do for such souls as these? 

"Once more, in the name of the God of 
heaven, I shall do the message to you which he 



Quotation from Richard Baxter. 195 

hath commanded us, and leave it in these 
standing lines to convert or condemn you. 
Hearken, all you that mind not God, and have 
no heart to holy things! Hearken, all you 
that by sinning in light have sinned yourselves 
into infidelity, and do not believe the word of 
God! He that hath an ear, let him hear the 
gracious yet dreadful call of God! His eye is 
all this while upon you. Your sins are regis- 
tered, and you shall surely hear of them all 
again. God keepeth the book now; and he 
will erelong write it all upon your consciences 
with its terrors, and then you shall keep it 
yourselves ! 

" O sinners, that you but knew what you are 
doing, and whom you are all this while offend- 
ing! The sun itself is darkness before the 
glory of that Majesty which you daily abuse 
and carelessly provoke. O that you did but a 
little know what case that wretched soul is in 
that hath engaged the living God against him ! 
If God be against thee, all things are against 
thee. This world is but thy prison, for all 
thou so lovest it, and thou art but reserved in 



196 The Endless Future. 

it to the day of wrath. The Judge is coming; 
thy soul is even going. Yet a little while, and 
thy friend shall say of thee, 'He is dead;' 
and then thou shalt see^the things that now 
thou dost despise, and feel that which now 
thou wilt not believe. O poor soul! there is 
nothing but a slender veil of flesh between 
thee and that amazing sight, which will quickly 
silence thee, and turn thy tone, and make thee 
of another mind. As soon as death hath 
drawn this curtain, thou shalt see that which 
will quickly leave thee speechless. And how 
quickly will that day and that hour come! 
When thou hast had a few more merry hours, 
and but a few more pleasant draughts, and a lit- 
tle more of the honors and riches and pleasures 
of the world, thy portion will be spent; and then 
of all thou soldest thy Saviour and salvation for 
nothing will be left but the heavy reckoning. 

"And O that you could but see what haste 
death makes, though he has not yet overtaken 
you! No post so swift, no messenger more 
sure. As sure as the sun will be with you in 
the morning, so sure will death be quickly 



Quotation from Richard Baxter. 197 

with you. And then where is your sport and 
pleasure? Then whose shall all these things 
be that you have gathered? O that you were 
wise to understand this, and that you did but 
consider your latter end! 

"No; this life will not last always, this pa- 
tience will not wait upon you still. Do not 
think that you shall abuse your Maker and 
Redeemer, and serve his enemies, and debase 
your souls, and trouble the world, and wrong 
the Church, and reproach the godly, and grieve 
your teachers, and hinder reformation — and all 
upon free cost. You know not yet what this 
must cost you, but you shall shortly know, 
when the righteous God shalUtake you in 
hand, unless you prevent it by a sound conver- 
sion and a speedy obeying of the call of God. 

' Reader, I have done with thee when thou 
hast perused this book; but sin hath not yet 
done with thee, and Satan hath not yet done 
with thee, and God hath not yet done with 
thee. As ever thou hopest to see the face of 
Christ, the Judge, and of the majesty of the 
Father with peace and comfort, and to be re- 



198 The Endless Future. 

ceived into glory, when thou art turned naked 
out of the world, I beseech thee to hear and 
obey the call of God. He that hath an ear, let 
him hear the call of God in this day of his sal- 
vation." 

Such, with slight alterations, is the way in 
which this holy man of God addressed the 
men of his times. Nothing that I could hope 
to write would breathe such tenderness and 
solemnity and persuasive power as this; and 
therefore I have chosen rather to transcribe it, 
that it may speak in my stead. 

Now, fellow-sinner, in God's name I send you 
this little book to give you one more warning 
of that coming wrath, from which there is but 
one way of escape. It shows you that human 
probation is a serious and tremendous matter; 
that God is greatly in earnest in pressing the 
call to repentance, and that the most stupen- 
dous sin possible or conceivable is that of 
slighting the offers of salvation through Jesus 
Christ; and that if slighted to the last, there 
will be no way of escaping the dreadful, endless 
penalty. 



Quotation from Richard Baxter. 199 

It is believed that an honest and careful 
consideration of the foregoing argument will 
lead to the conviction that this must certainly 
be the final doom of all who die in impeni- 
tence. Or if any one should feel that the cer- 
tainty of this was not made out to his satisfac- 
tion, it would seem that he must admit that at 
least the probability is; or if even this shall not 
be admitted, yet the possibility must be admit- 
ted. And let it be remembered that the bare 
'possibility of it is more terrific than all the 
other certainties of the universe. 

Hear, therefore^ ye dying sinners, the warn- 
ing voice of God: "Turn ye, turn ye, for why 
will ye die? " Hear also the despairing cry of 
his infinite tenderness and benevolence, if you 
persevere in sin to the last: "How shall I give 
thee up? My heart is turned within me; my 
repentings are kindled together." 



THE END. 







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